McCarthy must be cursing his luck

The life of county manager must be nerve wracking whenever your players are in action for their clubs in a championship weekend.
I'm sure they sit in dread of the type of phonecall which tells them that one of their star players have been hurt over the weekend playing havoc with well-laid plans for the season which may have begun as far back as October last year.
Take Justin McCarthy as an example this season. A year ago he was enjoying a great season with the Waterford hurling side.
The National League title was under their belts and preparing to launch a strongly fancied bid for the All-Ireland title.
Waterford lit up the Munster championship with another great win but eventually floundered tired and mentally drained in the All-Ireland semi final against a fit and hungry Limerick.
This year Waterford have been slow out of the blocks, many felt McCarthy has been nursing his ageing warriors for the last big battle.
Instead slowly but surely the bottom is falling out of the Waterford challenge. Eoin Murphy, Eoin Kelly and Paul Flynn are all expected to miss the opening Munster championship game with Clare on June 1.
Now the goal scoring star of last season Dan Shanahan, who hadn't really got into his stride in this year's league, has ligament damage to his knee and looks set to miss the first game too.
Dan was playing in a senior hurling championship game for his club Lismore in a victory over Mount Sion. He will be out for three weeks although the injury was feared to be much worse initially but it will make it difficult for him to start against Clare.
The only good news for McCarthy is that Tony Browne got the all clear after being sent off in a club game.
However, I noticed that Browne only came in to the game as a sub and it was his second sending off in six months.
Just wonder is he beginning to suffer from grumply old man syndrome as your pace goes you get a little more aggressive in the absence of being able to stay with them.
Tony Browne's a wonderful hurler but he has struggled against blistering pace in the last year or two.
I can't see the Decies get out of the starting blocks against Clare in the absence of their casualties and McCarthy must be hoping that some of his missing players might just make it to the starting line.