The bumper crowd, which will exceed 25,000, and the dark shadow cast by the All-Ireland final mean the stakes are higher than they should be this early in the campaign.
Cork won’t want to give an inch to their great rivals at SuperValu Páirc Uí Chaoimh on Saturday night, while Tipperary would love to sow seeds of doubt into the hosts’ minds before the championship rematch. Yet both counties know this is the warm-up before the real stuff starts in two months.
Ben O’Connor’s side have no choice but to front up on home turf, where Liam Cahill might look at his options and get a decent look at Cork’s tweaked approach post-Pat Ryan. You’d imagine once the performance is strong, the result won’t bother Tipp.