Nicky English: Traditional Kilkenny virtues see them home as mistakes undermine Clare

After the flatness of the Saturday semi-final, Kilkenny and Clare gave us a really entertaining game. Last year Clare had their excuses about a lack of energy after a gruelling campaign. This time, though, they did – eventually – turn up for it and even put themselves in a winning position.

From an early stage they were under pressure at the back. Eoin Cody had them in all sorts of trouble and the corner backs were vulnerable and were prone to foul.

By half time Kilkenny had a good lead and the Clare tally of 10 points was just too low. The pre-match calculation that they just wouldn’t score enough was vindicated. That total of 25 points was always unlikely to beat Kilkenny. On Saturday we saw Limerick step it up and hit 30. That’s the benchmark.

Mark Rodgers missed his first free. Tony Kelly missed a free. There were also several blocks, including by Conor Fogarty on Rodgers when there was a goal on. Kilkenny were comfortable – TJ Reid was prominently involved in general play and deadly from frees that Clare were conceding, often needlessly.

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It was hard to see how Clare were going to turn it around. In fairness they did and hit the front, but looking back on the match as a whole mistakes really cost them.

In a winning position, there was calamity when Rory Hayes got caught on the ball for the Eoin Cody goal. Mistakes did for them. Even after Shane O’Donnell got a fantastic goal to haul them back into it they coughed up frees to hand over the lead. The second one in particular, on Richie Hogan, was needless.

Still, Clare had the winning of it. Again Eoin Murphy came to Kilkenny’s rescue with a magnificent stop from Peter Duggan in injury-time. Take that with Fogarty’s block and maybe O’Donnell might have passed the ball when Murphy pulled off a previous save.

They’ll have regrets. I’m not sure why Brian Lohan went with the sweeper. Maybe he was worried about the injury concerns in the defence and thought he would shore it up a bit. But it didn’t set a great tone for them, and as far as I know it was the first time they had done it this year.

Seadna Morey looked a bit lost and ultimately when they went man-to-man in the second half they were more effective. There were problems in the full back line as there had been in the Munster final but they weren’t addressed.

It was a great match and Kilkenny deserved the win in the end. Their work rate, the hooking and blocking and ability to get scores got them there. In some ways they are a work in progress but their hurling is neat and tidy and they will have the confidence of having run Limerick close last year.

Judging by Saturday, though, it’s an improving Limerick. They gave their best performance of the season in seeing off Galway and stepped up a gear on their Munster performances.

The contest died early. Galway crashed and burned in a couple of minutes around the half-hour mark. In the 30th minute Kevin Cooney goes through with every chance of a goal but Mike Casey takes Brian Concannon’s shot off the line. A goal would have extended Galway’s lead to eight points, 2-12 to 1-7.

Instead Darragh O’Donovan goes up the other end and scores a point and the margin is down to four but you could sense Limerick drawing inspiration from the turnaround.

Until then Galway had been energetic and effective, creating space in the Limerick defence and being able to find Conor Whelan with measured ball. Evan Niland was unerring on the frees and their puckouts found their men with room to operate. But this cleverly constructed play stuttered to halt in the 32nd minute. Brian Concannon responded to O’Donovan’s score with a point and the lead stood at 1-13 to 0-8.

From then on Galway were outscored by a scarcely believable 0-5 to 1-16.

Diarmaid Byrnes thundered into the match and scored two massive frees. Cian Lynch got his season up and running, scoring a point and getting on to a world of ball. For Limerick to cut the deficit to a point before half time was a strong statement of where the match was going.

Galway’s puckout strategy completely failed and Limerick mopped up. Kyle Hayes, the outstanding Darragh O’Donovan and Byrnes devoured ball, and Lynch signalled a real return to form. Peter Casey got his scores and this was all significant in the context of the season so far.

We had noticed how they had struggled to get off the 0-25 mark and in this game they got that back up to 30 points. The players that they needed to step up as regards scoring did so. The lack of input from Lynch, Casey and Hegarty had been noticeable in the smaller scoring returns and they addressed that.

Those who had been playing well continued to do so, and Aaron Gillane maintained the razor-edge of his Munster form with two goals.

Limerick, after the four-week rest since the Munster final, are back where they want to be, in Croke Park, and finding their best form.