Paraic Fanning admits it's do-or-die for Waterford after they crashed to their second successive defeat in the Munster SHC.
Yesterday's 0-18 to 2-30 loss to Tipperary leaves them in a precarious position ahead of the visit of All-Ireland champions Limerick to Walsh Park.
"The lads are hurting inside as much as everybody is over the result. There’s two ways we can go, we can leave the season peter out or we can fight for our lives," the Deise manager said.
"And I'd be very, very surprised if it's anything other than us fighting for our lives in Walsh Park when we play Limerick and Cork. It's all about trying to rescue our season now.
"Did we go toe-to-toe with Tipp when we got back into the game? Yeah. It was only patches of that for us. When we play like that, we can match the best. We just need to do it on a more consistent basis for longer periods of the game.”
Fanning agreed that the 29th dismissal of Conor Gleeson left his side facing an uphill battle.
"With 20 minute sto go or so, we dragged ourselves back into it, had a lot of momentum, then it just petered out. Maybe our legs went a little, and maybe the extra man that was part of it."
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