THE CURTAIN-raiser to Sunday’s Division One hurling league final at Semple Stadium in Thurles carries far greater significance than the main event. According to Wexford manager Colm Bonner, defeat to Ger O’Loughlin’s Clare may cause irreparable damage to the sport in a county that last won an All-Ireland title in 1996.

The winner gets promoted. The loser remains mired in the doldrums for another campaign, which would be Wexford’s third season out of the top flight. The gap is monumental, both managers agree, and Bonner simply stated their failure to return to Division One is “killing hurling” in Wexford.

The man once known as “The Sparrow” during his heyday scuttling around for the great Clare team of the 1990s agrees: “I feel for counties that have a proud tradition in hurling, if you remain in Division Two the interest level drops considerably,” said O’Loughlin.

“We’ve seen that in Clare over the last couple of months, attendances were poor and that. Obviously the GAA have to have a serious look at that kind of thing because we need to be playing Division One hurling to generate senior talent. We have an up and coming under-21 team that I think would benefit and hurling would be the better for it if we could be playing in Division One.”

Both men noted recent challenge matches against Division One sides proved more beneficial than the league encounters, with an honourable mention for Carlow, who beat Wexford 0-16 to 0-13 earlier in the campaign.

Bonner calls the current structures a football solution to a hurling problem and feels the remaining household names in Wexford hurlers will lose the motivation to continue if they are confined to the lower flight.

“You look at the likes of Keith Rossiter or Darren Stamp or Eoin Quigley or “Gizzy” Lyng. If they have to spend another year in Division Two after spending all their career playing the top teams and only in 2007 being in a league semi-final. Those players are finding it very hard to motivate themselves.

“I think the GAA really seriously need to look at it. You have a Division Four team in football like Limerick and they could compete with the likes of Cork who were in the Division One final. Whereas in hurling, you have your 10 or 11 counties and that’s where hurling needs to be promoted.”