TOM HUMPHRIEStakes an in-depth look at the whys and the wherefores of Kilkenny's remarkable and prolonged dominance of the game
Tribute Bands Don’t Chart
1. AUGUST 2001: A seminal moment in misunderstanding Kilkenny. Galway came to Croke Park still seething from the previous summer's humiliation in the All-Ireland semi-final when Kilkenny had been unstretched and unfussed for most of an eight- point win. This time Galway are frenetically hard and physical. They have Eugene Cloonan as their cutting blade. He scores 2-9 of 2-15. The hurling world watches and decides that Johnny Kilkenny doesn't like it up him. Half forward lines everywhere get beefed up.
In Kilkenny though they decided the softness wasn’t physical it was mental. 2001 was a time of self-celebration, a time for reading in the paper that the full forward line of Carter, Carey and Shefflin was perhaps the greatest ever (they shot 4-10 between them in the previous year’s All Ireland final). After that the cat never laughed till the fat lady had sung. You got comfortable after the first weekend in September. Everything else was edgy.
The next time Kilkenny lost a couple of big matches was 2004. Wexford and Cork ran at them. went with pace and passing. Wexford needed a last-minute goal. Cork won by eight points. Tribute bands are never better than the real thing.
2. AUGUST 2005:Strange and wonderful. Galway, beaten a year earlier by 19 points, came to Croke Park loaded with speed and caught Kilkenny on a day of rare self-doubt. All summer Kilkenny were heavy-legged. They had failed to score a goal in either of their two championship games before Galway. The weekend before the Galway game they came to Dublin for a training weekend which included a session in Croke Park. A very un-Kilkenny thing to do. They closed the doors to training sessions at home. Again. Not done in Kilkenny. The game was one of those glorious freaks. Kilkenny scored four goals. Galway scored five. Niall Healy scored three while Kevin Broderick was warming up to replace him. Galway were loaded with pace that day though and Noel Hickey was missing and Peter Barry was caught for pace. Cat away. Mice playing. Certainly Richie Murray careered into his opponent from the start but Galway turned this into a shooting match rather than a boxing match. Still the myth persisted. To beat Kilkenny you have to flake them first.
3. CASE IN POINT. The National League final of 2009. Kilkenny should be ambush fodder. The league has been a lap of honour, a series of double-digit wins. The champions should be plump and self-satisfied. Tipp duly charge into Kilkenny with the delicacy of Panzer tanks. For 10 minutes or so the Kilkenny line is perplexed and unusually animated. Little wonder. James Ryall mugged on his own turf for Tipp's first goal. Brian Hogan stretchered off after Tipp's second.
Everywhere the big hits going in because it has become the perceived wisdom that whether you regard Kilkenny as “overly physical” or merely tacking a line which sees them sail “close to the wind” the only way to beat them is to stand up physically and win that battle first. To be more Kilkenny than the stripey men themselves are. Kilkenny won. As they did last September against the same opposition. Tipp, on current evidence, are in recession.
4. TULLAMORE 2009:Galway had it all. A good start with a Joe Canning goal. A physicality which came naturally enough not to be a distraction to the hurling. Having slipped behind at the break, a third goal not long after put them in front again with the home stretch in sight. First year in Leinster and about to bring down the ruling house? Kilkenny hit 10 points without reply. All over.
5. The All-Ireland Final of 2008:Waterford come out wound up like 15 incendiary devices. There is flaking and there is sledging and in the case of one corner back there is kicking from behind. Silly stuff. Punch and Judy stuff.
Corner forward Eddie Brennan at corner forward has shipped some of the nonsense. How does retribution come? Eddie pops 2-1 before the 20th minute. Kilkenny turn the game into a parade, imperious as their bruises and the belts add up.
Eyes on the road Hands on the wheel
1. NO SIDESHOWS.Not since the Charlie Carter shoot-out has anything apart from hurling happened in Kilkenny.
2. FIRST RULE OF KK?No talking about KK. Loose-lipped newspaper interviews? Nah. Big egos shooting the breeze? Nah. Jackie Tyrrell, Mick Kavanagh. Brian Hogan. How many non-natives would pick them out of a police line-up? Would they ever be in a police line-up.
3. SECOND RULE OF KK?:No football. There is one holy and apostolic church.
4. NO STRIKES:No porn movies. No nightclub incidents.
5. NURTURE THE GRIEVANCES:Making history. Pushing the envelope. Breaking records. Being the best you can be. All those positive motivations have their place but Kilkenny never forget. And they don't forgive. They get even. And then some. "Our preparations were supposed to be outdated, lacking in method and finesse. By comparison with Cork and their sophisticated ways we were pre- historic" Brian Cody on the 2006 treble.
Keep on Keeping on
1. CONVEYOR:We talk often about the Kilkenny conveyor belt and certainly the work done in Kilkenny at underage level has an evangelical zeal to it. If Dublin's underage system has eased off a little after the first shoots of success came through, Kilkenny's is still relentless. There is no off switch. Last year was an oddity.
No under-21 or minor All-Ireland titles but a 17th Leinster minor title in 20 years, and a 12th Leinster under-21 title in 20 years. This year St Kieran’s are back as All-Ireland colleges champions for the first time since 2004 and we will see what follows this summer.
2. CLUB:The odd thing about the conveyor belt however is its impact is unseen. Despite rotating players in and out of Nowlan Park, Kilkenny have used only 31 players on the four-year run. The real impact is in the standard of club hurling in Kilkenny with so many quality players feeding into the club pool. Henry Shefflin, commenting this week about not having played county hurling since last year's All-Ireland, said he had played a few club games recently (and there is nothing better). He is right. Kilkenny is perhaps the only county in the country where players can go back to their clubs for a few weeks and not come back with bad habits. They get more good games than anybody else.
3. NO CIVIL WARS:Since the little dust down with Charlie Carter there is no doubt as to who is the sheriff of Dodge City. More important though, there is no doubt at county board level. No egos cross the line into the training ground. The team is the team. Everything else serves the team.
4. TRADITION:In many counties back-to-back wins makes for a winter's drinking. Little impresses the Kilkenny hurling public however. It's about vintages rather than wins. It's about competing against the stripey men of the past, always pushing the envelope out further, always pushing for that which was thought unattainable.
5. CODY:The ol' man river of hurling. 'He mus' know sumpin' But don't say nothin', He jus' keeps rollin' He keeps on rollin' along.' Total control. Total calm. No drama.
Cometh the hour
Cometh the boy,
Cometh the hour
Exit the man
1. THE DISAPPOINTMENTSof Henry Shefflin's underage career are the stuff of legend and what good days he had he laughingly dismisses as being the result of various managements needing to have a "fella with a big ole arse around the square". Still.
His breakthrough in 1999 typified Kilkenny’s ability to produce precisely the sort of talent needed at the right time. DJ Carey’s departure half a decade ago should have sent Kilkenny into a transition tailspin. The transfer was seamless. Tomorrow Shefflin will become the leading championship scorer of all time.
2. EOIN LARKIN:When your team scores 6-28 on your debut and you as a forward score not a point of that total you don't imagine that you have secured tenure. Larkin broke through in the hammering of Offaly in the 2005 Leinster semi-final and has started every championship game since. Nine points from his first nine games. Nineteen championship appearances and just three goals scored in that time but how many half backs have been stifled in those 19 games, how much ball has been processed into the Kilkenny full forward line? Larkin emerged as the model for selfless half forwards everywhere.
3. TOMMY WALSH:Nuff said.
4. RICHIE POWER:Being a scion and being an underage sensation hold no guarantees of fast-tracking into a warm place in Cody's heart. Cody blooded Power, decided he wasn't the finished article. Placed him back in the warming drawer. Took him out for another look. Almost there.
5. CHA FITZPATRICK:When Ken Coogan, Bryan Barry and Richie Mullally were auditioning for the role of Derek Lyng's midfield partner, the Cinderella figure inside cleaning the kitchen was Cha Fitzpatrick. Two minor All- Irelands, two under-21 titles, he came in as a corner forward and his apprenticeship (three points in four starts) did little to suggest he would emerge as an engine-room midfielder. This year? Suddenly Fennelly and Rice are the sitting tenants in midfield.
TJ Reid who seems as if he has been with us forever should nail down a place. And John Mulhall, with the unconventional-looking style, will be pushing. And a couple of Hogans, and a Gorta fightback.
The leaders of the pack
1. AH THE PACK:In comparison with Kilkenny's obsessive excellence the chasing pack have tended to hobble themselves. Kilkenny have the best structures in place, the best school system, the most enlightened coaching.
It’s remarkable that Ned Quinn put the structures in place at the start of the good times not in the throes of some famine. The system has put hurling at the heart of a county’s culture and is built to regenerate itself.
2. CORKare still recovering, having been kneecapped for the third time in a decade by their own county board. Not enough to have officials who shoot themselves in the foot once a year, in Cork they take their brightest and best out, Beál na Blath-style.
Kilkenny’s pre-eminence has overshadowed a golden era for Waterford but seems also have overshadowed a built-in tendency to go weak at the knees on the big occasion. From Gerald to Justin to Davy is a progression which may lead to Kurtz’s lair in Apocalypse Now. Wexford were driven into recession by Kilkenny when they should have kicked on from 1996. Offaly are off making their way back from the wilderness. Clare? Self-immolation at county board level and a failure to sow any seeds in the good years. Limerick. Well yes, Limerick. All of the above. Galway have squandered underage picking second only to those produced in Kilkenny and the Loughnane years brought serious disappointment. Tipperary wasted the post-Nicky era and only the unfolding season will tell us if they believed too much all the headings which said they were the champions-in- waiting. Dublin? We’ll see!
3. EXPERIENCE:In 2004 Kilkenny were looking for a third title in a row when Cork stopped them. Since then they done three in a row. Moved on and completed four in a row. Is there a huge difference between the pressures experience at high summer in 2004, 2008 and 2009?. Not really. Kilkenny take pressure on board as part of the deal.
4. THE FOUR IN A ROWyears included three National League finals, two of which were won. Kilkenny have contested six of the last eight finals. Yet the principle form of imitation with which Kilkenny are flattered is physical. This spring Kilkenny's form has been as worrying as it has been since the Cody era began.
Three defeats (Galway, Tipp and Cork) is more than a Cody team has endured in any league campaign.
Kilkenny claim to be fretting that these were games they would have won in the past but Ballyhale’s run to a club All-Ireland cost Kilkenny an influential chunk of their panel. And for a team which has been on the go since the 1999 All-Ireland final this was a year to rest up.
5. EVERY GRIEVANCEhas been settled. Every enemy has been mowed down. Kilkenny are psychologically stronger than any team in this year's championship, with the possible exception of Cork who have a race memory of happier times when they beat Kilkenny.
Recent years have done little to diminish that memory but the legs have begun to ache and slow up.
