WARM TO THE TASK

Stone-cold classics on the cards in Leinster and Munster

- BY GARRY DOYLE

DECEMBER'S here but this is the kind of weekend that reminds us why club GAA games can warm you quicker than any woollen scarf.

Three finals, three different stories: Ballyhale's aristocrats trying to swat away St Martin's dreamers; Ballyboden's slick Dublin machine squaring up to Athy's uprising; and Daingean Uí Chúis marching from a 77-year fairy tale into the path of battle-hardened St Finbarr's.

Winter finals aren't about polish — they're about nerve. And this weekend, nerves will be rattling like hail on a tin roof.

LEINSTER CLUB SHC FINAL

St Martin's (Wexford) v Ballyhale Shamrocks (Kilkenny), Croke Park, 6.30pm

THIS evening, two clubs walk into Croke Park separated by county lines but bridged by a shared sense of possibility. One is accustomed to this stage; the other is only arriving.

Ballyhale Shamrocks, the most decorated club side in the sport, come as if by birthright. St Martin's of Wexford come as if by prophecy.

For St Martin's, this is uncharted ground.