It would be borderline cruel were he to miss out once again following so many near misses and placed efforts.

Additionally, and despite a relatively subdued display at Nowlan Park on Sunday, Callanan’s contributions are bound to be critical to the Premier’s ambitions again this summer.

Callanan, by his exceptional standards, was well-held generally by Wexford’s defence – the attacker registered 0-3 including a 65.

Yet, he remains a worthy market leader for the Hurler of the Year gong given Michael Ryan’s side are expected to retain the Liam McCarthy Cup.

Thing is, Callanan already has extremely stiff competition from within his own ranks in the form of John McGrath.

Has there been a more accomplished, elegantly ruthless performer in the Allianz NHL so far? Basically, no. McGrath, in fact, has kicked on from a breakthrough campaign last year and is even more frighteningly devastating presently.

His elusiveness defines his class. McGrath must be a nightmare to mark. Surveying the landscape surrounding him, he manages to slip-slide away from defenders with ease and find locations on the pitch that allows his technical qualities to scorch Tipp’s opponents.

On Sunday, he collected another man of the match award and provided he remains fit and well, it is McGrath that could continue to progress and be the code’s main man this year.

The more and more we see of Tipp confidence expands in their capacity to land September honours.

Ironically, it is their opponents next Sunday, Galway, that could cause them more problems than most in the championship, were the counties to meet. The form of recent campaigns tells us this.

Therefore, however the league final goes, it might tell us a thing or two as to how a potential championship clash would work out.

Nothing more than that, though, because Tipp will be without Callanan after news broke of him having sustained a broken thumb in their last-four outing. The form, then, will be skewed.

Right now, Ryan’s men are a far more potent entity than Micheál Donoghue’s outfit, particularly in terms of goalscoring. The unavailability of Callanan obviously changes that, however.

With Joe Canning operating in a withdrawn role, Galway’s scope for creating and executing majors seems to have diminished marginally.

I appreciate that statement might come across as questionable as the westerners have scored three in their last two league games.

However, if Donoghue’s charges are to deny Tipp a title they genuinely crave it’s probably that Galway will need to pilfer at least three goals.

Yet, aside from Conor Cooney’s green flag in the second half of their semi-final victory over Limerick, the Tribesmen did not engineer any other true goalscoring opportunities.

Yes, Galway’s inside line of Conor Whelan, Cathal Mannion and Cooney performed well against the Treaty.

However, too often the trio were roaming a little too far from Nickie Quaid’s posts.

Galway will require somebody to sit on the edge of the square on this forthcoming occasion. Otherwise, Tipp’s full-back line will be only too delighted to defend diagonal balls into the corners, positions whereby orchestrating green flags from is far from easy.

Donoghue’s team hit 1-21 playing within themselves, however and so there is definitely more in their tank for an assignment such as this.

They were casual in possession on a number of occasions last Sunday as well. Canning produces some incredibly memorable moments with ball in-hand, obviously. However, he can be guilty of lapses in concentration too which resulted in straightforward turnovers for Limerick.

You can safely assume the Portumna man will not be as blasé around the middle-third in the decider.

Nevertheless, currently, it is widely agreed Tipp are a more coherent collective. The westerners, at this moment in time, scream of a side that’ll come on for every run-out they get, peaking at the business end of the All-Ireland series.

That is not to say they cannot win this silverware but it will take a significant leap forward in the space of seven days, form-wise, for that to transpire.

Ryan must have been beaming on the bus away from Kilkenny city. Aside from the obvious of actually advancing to the final, the character his group displayed was remarkable. The Slaneysiders chucked the kitchen sink at the Premier and were still 11 points in arrears at the full-time whistle. Better still for Ryan, he also has a stick or two to verbally cane his troops with because were Wexford not as forgiving in front of Darren Gleeson’s sticks the Slaneysiders’ league odyssey may have rolled on for another week.

Tipp, too, had many wides, 14 in fact but of Wexford’s nine wides in the first-half, at least five of them should really have been white flags as the positions the shots were taken from were more than advantageous.

Therefore, Tipp can muster in the region of another 15% improvement. That alone is a scary prospect for the pretenders to their All-Ireland throne.

Donoghue and his selectors will ponder plans for negating the likes of McGrath and his in-form brother Noel.

Given the form the younger sibling is enjoying that time may be better spent focusing on minimising the possessions McGrath will receive from his team-mates.

Galway’s half-forward line will have to counteract Tipp’s primary possession-generators in Ronan and Pádraic Maher.

Stopping the Premier at source is evidently the best policy for all-comers. If this does not happen, McGrath could have another whirlwind afternoon.

Prior to McGrath’s presence opponents knew that curtailing Callanan would represent a massive chunk of the work needed to overcome Tipp.

Now, though, and with McGrath in such scintillating shape, defenders have a different attacking headache to deal with.

The Loughmore-Castleiney star is becoming an unmarkable commodity; the jewel in Tipp’s crown.