Derek McGrath is relishing the prospect of pitting his young Waterford side against Kilkenny on Sunday week.

Na Deise will lock horns with their noisy neighbours in a mouth-watering All-Ireland semi-final at Croke Park and their manager can't wait for that game to arrive:

"The only pressure is the pressure that you put on yourself. We are going up to Croke Park and we are going to be as competitive as we can be against a force that seem to be able to cope with these five-week breaks better than anyone else," he is quoted in The Irish Times.

"It is great to look forward for the people of Waterford, a semi-final against Kilkenny. There will be a bit of banter in the coming weeks. We can learn a lot from Kilkenny and their whole approach, their absolute savagery and ravenous nature when it comes to winning and their humility when they win.

"I wouldn't like to put a stop to it at this stage, the year we have from 1B, going unbeaten all the way through the league and winning the league.

"I think people in the aftermath of this display [against Dublin] will look at the Tipperary display a little closer. With 67 minutes gone there were three points in it and we felt there was a lot of good elements to our play in the Tipp game and we took them and tweaked them a little. It's a massive challenge but one we are looking forward to."

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