Forde's focus is firmly set on Cork

Premier County attacker Jason Forde doesn't think that the nature of the Tipp victory over Cork in the Allianz National Hurling League will have any bearing on next Sunday's clash in the Munster championship.

The flame-haired Silvermines school teacher (who is working in Nenagh College) offers the view that a true reflection of the hurling scene is very difficult to determine.

“You don't really get a true reflection of what's actually happening on the ground because teams are probably tailoring their training to peak at different times of the year. You don't know if a team might have been training hard during the week before a match. I don't think the league has much bearing on the championship and if you look at Cork's record over the last few years in the Munster championship they've been the real form team. Going down to Páirc Uí Chaoimh is going to be a big ask for us, but we feel like we have a lot of work done and that we're in a good position to put in a really strong performance,” Jason Forde told tipperarylive.ie.

Despite the longer than expected gap between the league and championship thanks to a surprise exit at the hands of Dublin in the quarter-finals Jason Forde is happy that Tipp have a better handle on the format in comparison to last year when they face four games in four weeks.

“We were in the league final last year and then had three or four rounds of the club championship and then into four rounds of Munster championship - that was tough on the body. We picked up a few injuries as a result of that. We used something like twenty-five players last year which was a big turnover, but this year has been a bit of a better run-in for us. As a player you want to progress and get to the latter end of the championship. Lads didn't really know what to do with themselves for a long while being out so early last year. It took a while to come to terms with it, but you have to use that as fuel and motivation to make sure it doesn't happen again,” Jason Forde said.

Agreeing that last year represented something of a breakthrough year for him personally, Jason pointed to his own extra work with MC Future Fitness to ensure that his body was ready for the demands of inter-county hurling. He decided to do something different to achieve a different result and it worked.

While Tipp might have been accused of looking beyond the Limerick game last year in the Munster championship first round and taking the four games as a whole, Jason says that it has to be all about the first round game against Cork this time round.

“I think it has to be all about Cork, to be honest,” Jason Forde explained.

“If you're getting into that kind of a game where you're looking one or two games down the line you can really take the focus off from where it needs to be.

“We saw that last year - if you don't get up and running in the championship early you can come under pressure. So, the Cork game is definitely all we're focusing on for the minute,” Jason Forde said while he also alluded to the sense of freshness which has arrived with the return of Liam Sheedy to the fold.

“From his own professional background he's used to working with people and that transfers into working with players as well. He probably knows how to get the best out of guys. He's just really an organised man and he has a really good back room team around him as well. He probably just brought a bit of freshness to the whole thing as well, which is needed, and bringing in a lot of those younger players brings a lot of enthusiasm and stuff like that around the place. So, there's just a good buzz there at the minute.”