Cats are a different animal with the smell of silverware

OF THE four provincial finalists in action this weekend, Kilkenny have been deemed the least likely to go on and win the All-Ireland. Galway, Cork and Clare lead the betting – in that order – with the Cats a whopping 11/2 to win Liam MacCarthy and as big as 5/2 to beat Galway in Croke Park tomorrow. On paper it seems a very big price indeed. Kilkenny have won eight of their last nine games in League and Championship, bagging the Division 1 title with a six-point victory over Tipperary in the final in April along the way. The last game they lost to anyone other than Galway was to Clare, way back on February 4. It hasn’t always been pretty, but they have found a way to win. And they are exactly where they would have hoped to be – in a Leinster final and three wins away from another All-Ireland. Of course, it’s very hard to take anything away from Galway, worthy 6/5 favourites to retain their All-Ireland title, 2/5 to retain their Leinster crown tomorrow. They have done all that’s been asked of them and more — showing up like a team possessed to mark their historic first home Leinster Championship match with an eight-point win over the Cats. That result fails to fully tell the story of that game, though, with a late Walter Walsh goal being disallowed. That goal would have kept Kilkenny in the game – instead Galway kicked on to run the score up. Outside of that defeat, Kilkenny have been ticking along quite nicely. They won their three other Leinster Championship group matches, but it is the scruffy nature of those wins that has them so roundly written off. They needed a last-gasp goal to beat Dublin and a nine-point second-half turnaround to see off Wexford at Nowlan Park. But they did it. And in the case of the Wexford game, they did it having taken off Colin Fennelly and Richie Hogan at half-time. Those two will be different animals tomorrow, back to full fitness and with the smell of silverware in the nostrils once again. Kilkenny have proven hard to beat this year as always — and that will more than likely be the case once again tomorrow.