"There was a dreadful air of depression around the place after the All Ireland semi-final defeat by Cork, but hard work at underage level is the only way forward for Waterford, " as Liam Cheasty, the secretary of the county's coaching and games development committee, remarked when Sideline Cuts ran into him the other day. Quite.

TEMPORARY CONFUSION BECOMING PERMANENT What is it about temporary substitutions that causes so much confusion? Last week, Ger Canning and Paul McStay had an amount of trouble uncovering the fact that Ciaran Whelan and Kevin Bonner had clashed heads in the midst of the high tempo semi-"nal. It led to much debate in the commentators' box. The boys speculated that Paul Caffrey had taken off his mid"eld talisman in an effort to prevent a second yellow card. They were wrong, of course, but you can't blame them for the befuddlement.

Once Bonner and Whelan reappeared, there was a further blurring of the lines, but the message eventually got through. It all begs the question, though . . . what can be done to ensure a clearer transfer of information from the referee to the watching public, in particular in relation to temporary replacements?

A decent solution could halt future substitution rows. And we've had enough of those already this year.

ANY CHANCE OF SOME PUNISHMENT Speaking of Ciaran Whelan. . .

During the course of this summer, Sideline Cuts has devoted space to both Matty Forde's alleged stamp and the ridiculous number of committees in place at the HQ. In all this confusion we're not really sure just how Matty got suspended on the back of video evidence but we do know that the ban he received was thoroughly deserved.

But is Whelan not deserving of something similar after his high tackle on Ronan McGarrity?

We've lost count of the number of times he should have been put off in recent seasons, but delayed punishment is better than nothing.