Joe Canning has warned that shape-shifting Limerick are only going to get stronger after surviving a Munster SHC scare against Clare on Sunday.
John Kiely's reigning All-Ireland champions bagged three goals in seven minutes to completely change the momentum of a contest they had been second best in.
The Treaty are hunting a fifth Liam MacCarthy Cup in a row - an unprecendent achievement. Rivals will be desperate to stop them, but former Galway talisman Canning said Kiely has his side primed to improve as the summer progresses.
"They'd a lot of guys where it was their first day out for a good few weeks. It probably took them a while to get going but when you look back on it, a lot of it was down to Clare just making a mistake for the goal and allowing them back in, giving them a little bit of oxygen to get going again.
"At 53, 54 minutes you were probably thinking, 'jeez Clare could run away with this'.
"But in fairness they are champions for a reason. Once you give them a sniff of it, they'll go for the jugular."
Canning noted that Limerick adopted a favoured tactical tweak that helped them to turn the tide.
"They probably funnelled back a lot of players into their own half and tried to cut off Clare a little bit," he said.
"That left huge space down the other end. They do that at times, they don't do it all the way through the match but if they're under a little bit of pressure, you'll often find... like Cian Lynch came into it for instance in the last 20 minutes and got on a world of ball. But up to that he was probably more centre-forward and not as deep.
"In the last 20 minutes he was going back to his own full-back line geting on ball, linking the play and then delivering ball up the field.
"They can change their shape a little bit at times. It's only small little fractions that they change but when it works it works - and nine times out of 10 it probably does work. That's (coach) Paul Kinnerk and these guys, they are very good at in-game management."
Tipperary are next up to try and derail the juggernaut at TUS Gaelic Grounds on Sunday. It's the Premier County's first outing since they suffered an eight-point loss to Clare in the league semi-final, and though Canning is loathe to completely write them off, he's expecting a Limerick victory.
"We haven't seen Tipperary in the last few weeks," he added.
"I think Limerick will come on a lot. There's questions for Limerick but I think the players that have come back from injury and stuff for them, that game yesterday will bring them on.
"It's very hard to see Tipperray, based on the last couple of months, how they'll beat Limerick. I could be wrong. Tipp have often surprised us before. Last year the first round against Clare, they got five goals against them in Ennis and won the game, so you never know."
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