Emmet Moloney writes for the 'The Irish Farmers Journal' and is a former sports columnist with 'The Kerryman'.

Championship football is back and memories of League matches with half-full grounds can be put away, writes Emmet Moloney...

The championship starts this weekend. As usual, we have the easy introduction to the summer: a few minnows to play an early game in Leinster, a dogfight in Ulster and Kerry have their first chance to look vulnerable. For many, myself included, Cork and Tipp will be the first real Sunday of the summer. That will be the day that mass, dinner, the papers and the children will need proper organising. That Sunday night will be a good one in the pub. That first night of real hurling. All conversations will start and finish with the match.

The football championship never captures the imagination as immediately as the hurling. It must have something to do with the slow-burning fuse that is the football summer. The unending back-door system and the recent inevitability of Kerry, Cork, Tyrone and the fact that Dublin will not win Sam adds to the anti-climactic feel.

What we badly need is a few early and decent-sized shocks in the football. Funnily enough, I think we’ll get one or two and for no good reason other than I feel it in my waters! Neither Kerry nor Tyrone nor even Cork will win the football crown.

We haven’t had a truly strange year in Gaelic football since about 1992 when Donegal and Clare made history. We need that again. We need the traditionally small counties making a bit of noise. And not just in qualifiers. In a year when their hurlers have opted out of serious competition, maybe Limerick can surprise with the big ball? Can Kildare put it up to Dublin? After losing the league final (badly), are Mayo going to bounce back? Can this be their year?

I’m nearly laughing as I write that. In nearly 20 years of writing championship previews I seem to trot that line out every May. But we say it every year because we mean it. That’s what football needs. Mayo lifting Sam Maguire. Forget the league final a few weeks ago. I recall a team losing a National Hurling League final back in 1995, looking limited in the process, yet four short months later they were All-Ireland hurling champions. Hurling was never the same again. Mayo, the real sleeping giant of GAA counties, are the neutrals’ greatest hope.

But back to more immediate matters. Can the footballers of Tipperary really topple the All-Ireland champions in Thurles this Sunday? Well, actually, they could. Here are four very good reasons why: first and foremost is the inescapable fact that Tipp aren’t that bad! Forget their league form, football is stirring in the county. They recently went to Tralee and won the Munster U-21 title. They have football and they are at a level where a very good day for them would be enough to catch Kerry.

The second reason for optimism is their manager, John Evans. Forget the fact that he is proving to be quite good at the job; he is also from Kerry. That means something. Look back at recent history. Mick O’Dwyer, Liam Kerins and Mickey Ned O’Sullivan are just three Kerryman who have managed against their native county. All managed to get their adopted counties to put it up to the Kingdom. That was no accident. Out of sight is never out of mind in Kerry.

As a Clareman living down there, who’s first love was hurling, it took me about three weeks to hear who was going well at Kerry training, who wasn’t on the panel and why he should be. In no time at all I could talk about Kerry’s first and second 15. All of this without really asking!

That’s the way down there. Training is usually public and well attended. Form is openly discussed. Criticism is rarely withheld. Evans will have heard all of this. He might even have seen some of it. He’ll know his opposition inside and out.

The third reason is timing. The middle of May? All-Irelands are never won here and Kerry, like most teams, are far from their peak. Traditionally in May they have lost to Cork and struggled badly to beat the minnows in Munster. In Kerry they think about All-Irelands and September. In Tipperary they will have been thinking about Kerry and May.

The last factor is a hunch about “the camp”. All is not right in the Kingdom. Apart from retirements – some enforced, some forced – there was the Kerry player who pulled out of the squad to concentrate on his studies. A Kerryman putting studies ahead of the chance to win an All-Ireland medal? Unheard of. To any young fella growing up in Kerry, playing and winning an All-Ireland senior football medal is the be all and end all. When I read that, a bell went off. Something is wrong when you hear that kind of talk. They won’t win the All-Ireland this year.

So, there you are. It’s set up for Tipp. And on Sunday night, after watching The Sunday Game, the chat in the pub will be that the Premier county could have, and maybe should have won the game. If only they had a bit more composure, we will say. Kerry were there for the taking. And they are.

It’s probably too much to hope for right out of the gate, but what a start to the championship it would be.

To catch Emmet's latest column, get 'The Irish Farmers' Journal' every Thursday...