Galway grasp the nettle
Tribesmen’s breakthrough after 53 years leaves Kerry grounded as Limerick also make history in Thurles to record first SHC win over Kilkenny since 1973
JOHN KIELY tries to slow the cascade of garlands falling his way by reminding the assembled literati that no medals have passed hands in the oily murk of Thurles. He has his reasons carefully indexed as to why Limerick must rein in all giddiness now. The ghosts of an unfulfilled past still cast too many shadows. Days like this can make fools of the best of men, set them signing cheques they cannot honour. This is just another step on the road, he says.
But he’s just rolling his tongue in service to a manager’s obligations here.
We know the truth, you see. We’ve seen it, heard it. The two buck leps as he swung down the dressing-room tunnel; the accompanying roars, bellicose and raw. The glassy eyes. An impression of the emotion in him rising to the very edge of control.
“History has no bearing on this group of players,” he says flatly. “They would never be defined by it. They’re going to set their own tone, their own direction and that’s that.”
Except, of course, history frames every revolution. It gives this kind of day a context and status. How you deal with that is what defines you and, well, Limerick’s first championship win over Kilkenny since 1973 was claimed in a manner contradicting so many tired, old prejudices that contaminate the broader view of their hurling.
PULSE
Richie Hogan’s 64 th-minute goal invited all the historic reflexes of panic, resentment and self-pity, yet Kiely’s men eschewed every one of them. Instead, they’d nailed three points from play over the Killinan goal within the next two minutes, announcing to utterly heroic opponents that this Limerick had the moxy within to be different.
The breadth of imagination with which they hurl wouldn’t entirely have been an identifying trait of their predecessors, yet it might just be the evenness of their pulse that will keep people talking now.
Other generations of Limerick teams would have interpreted Hogan’s goal as the familiar, cold grammar of a looming Kilkenny assassination.
Limerick were palpably the better, bigger, more rounded team. Yet Eoin Murphy had consistently denied them goals and doubt can exact a vicious punishment when the opposition is wearing stripes.
To that end, these past three weeks have been another Brian Cody miracle. Because the only thing settled and balanced and entirely persuasive about Kilkenny this summer has been their demeanour. Every way you look at this team, there’s the sense of compromise and unevenness and hurried repair. Logically, they shouldn’t have it in them to go toe-to-toe with big, square-shouldered teams like Galway and Limerick.
But Cody’s Kilkenny just have that knack of reaching for your collar with a cold hand.
Limerick’s worries, then, were echoes from another place. Echoes they chose to disregard. They outscored Kilkenny 0-5 to 0-1 from Hogan’s goal to the end, two of those points from the majestic Tom Morrissey. Yet, post-match, the Ahane man shared his manager’s mistrust of any symphony now brewing.
If it had been 45 years since Limerick’s last summer win against the Cats, he saw little meaning in the arithmetic.
“It was, what, only four or five games which isn’t a lot really,” suggested Morrissey. “It’s probably blown up a bit when they say 45 years. So we won’t let that affect us. We’re a different bunch. We had our own job to do and we did it in style.
“This group has a bit of steel about them. There’s a never-say-die attitude there. Huge resilience in the group. Even when they did get that goal, there was a real mental strength shown. Not once was there panic. It was straight back to your position, get the next ball and get on the road again.”
The meltdown in Ennis made us wonder if Limerick, under duress, could do that. When they rolled through the gears, they could look imperious. But pushed up against a wall? That’s where Kilkenny took them to here.
Just over half an hour in, all of Limerick’s forwards had scored from play against just two of Kilkenny’s. Limerick had 15 scores from 20 shots. They’d seen Murphy save brilliantly from Aaron Gillane and Gearóid Hegarty.
And yet? Their cushion was three points at the mid-point. Nothing really.
What followed was extraordinary. Kilkenny, scenting opportunity, just kept coming and Limerick – now in a war-zone – had to chase down the best of themselves. Hogan’s goal seemed an invitation to abort that chase, but they would not countenance it.
It might have been different, of course, had Limerick managed at any time to find Murphy’s net. But the Glenmore man dealt brilliantly with second-half efforts from Gillane and
Seamus Flanagan. A Limerick goal at any time might just have blown a hole in the script, but they were taking rock hammers to reinforced concrete here.
“We were prepared for it, nothing changed” insists Kiely of the Hogan goal. “We knew it was going to happen and, when you know something is going to happen, you’re prepared for it. Fellas have been a couple of years in their preparation to get to this point, they have the resolve to do these things out on the field.
“That’s what it takes. You don’t deserve to be in an All-Ireland semi-final unless you can do things like that.”
He mentions their games this year against Galway and Tipperary and Cork as other examples of a Limerick team with different, sturdier DNA. “The most over-riding factor is these guys keep demonstrating ferocious qualities like honesty, leadership and calmness on the ball” says Kiely.
“These are the defining attributes of the team. There have been lots of moments, but they haven’t been defin- ing moments for the team. The team is defined by itself, its own attributes, its own characteristics.”
Both benches delivered huge contributions, Kiely through Peter Casey and Shane Dowling; Cody through Richie Leahy and John Donnelly.
Yet, down the home straight, Limerick’s hurling was the calmer and more calculated. A repudiation of history really. And, accordingly, a statement.
Yet, for Cody, the achievement of, somehow, winning another National League and sending out a team that, consistently, looked greater than the sum of its parts shouldn’t be downplayed.
“The expectations from everybody, everywhere were that we would absolutely not be on the radar for anything,” he told us. “But that would never be our expectation or thinking because we’d always have great ambition and belief in Kilkenny hurling.
“We didn’t win, but we went down very, very marginally.”
The only way they know.