Bennett set to be sidelined through injury until March

Déise manager Peter Queally hopes to see Stephen Bennett back in action at the end of their Division 1B campaign in March. The 2020 All Star is currently sidelined with a hip injury.

"Stephen is working away but he has a lot of rehab to do. We'd hope to see Stephen towards the end of the league. That's his aim. As we all know, he has a catalogue of injuries with his hips and stuff. He is on a programme with Michael O'Sullivan that he is sticking rigidly to. The goal and the aim is to hopefully see Stephen at some stage towards the end of the league."

New captain Dessie Hutchinson is also on Waterford's long injury list. "Dessie has a couple of injuries from the club season," Queally explained. "He hurt his shoulder against Doon so he is currently recuperating from that. He is on a programme. Once he goes back into contact in a couple weeks, maybe mid league, he should be back."

Michael Kiely should return to the attack for the league opener against Carlow next month. "Michael is close. We've a game next week and we're playing Limerick the week after. The week before the league, Michael might be back in action again."

Queally was pleased with the attitude of his team in Piltown on Saturday. "We were delighted with the runout in better conditions. Underfoot was much better, overhead was much better. The display was decent, a good step up on last week. There were a lot of elements last week that we weren't happy with, especially our intensity and our aggression levels. I thought today, bar a couple of lulls here and there, we fought hard. Our aggression was there and our intensity levels. A few areas then that we mightn't be happy with, our conversion rate was very low, I thought we had a lot of bad wides. You just hope that on another day they go over. It would be worse if we weren't creating chances which we weren't last week. We just need to get the radar right the next day and work on our accuracy."

The visitors were quick out of the traps with that first minute strike from Tom O'Connell. "We really emphasised the importance of starting well. That's what killed us last week; our first twenty minutes was so tepid. Truth be told, we should have been more ahead at half time. It was a 35 minutes that we dominated for long periods."

Seamus Fitzgerald stood out once again at corner back. "It's his second good outing in a row. He was very good last week in a team that you could say underperformed. I thought he was one of the guys that stood up again here today. He was on a couple of good hurlers there at various stages and did very well. You'd be happy with him."

He was also happy with how the other newcomers showed up. "Sam Fitzgerald got his first start for Waterford here today. A big, athletic lad, very wholehearted. He gave his all as well. Willie Beresford had a start at midfield and worked very hard in the first half. He was unlucky for a couple of scores. With another few games under his belt, some of them might go over."