They should kit Brian Whelahan out properly for once and for all. Superheroes shouldn't wear the same drab garb as the rest of us. Give him some rubber gear and a cloak and make him the Caped Crusader, damn it. He shouldn't just be number five.

He was named Man of the Match yesterday but after 20 minutes it was looking like a cliffhanger from the old matinee days. Whelahan toed to the tracks with the steam engine bearing down on him. Toot! Toot!

Brian McEvoy was making a name for himself with two points pinched off Whelahan already. Offaly were in tangled disarray. Then with one bound, etc, etc.

The bench switched Whelahan to attack and he scored the goal that broke Kilkenny's spirit having earlier made the block which kept his team alive.

It should be noted of course that he started the game with a dose of influenza which would have killed a horse and finished the game with a torn hamstring. If only he'd lost a limb or two Kilkenny might have made a game of it.

"Yeah. I woke up nursing the flu," he says as if it were a mere itch. "Woke up yesterday morning (Saturday) not feeling well. I was dying really. Not feeling great so I started to take antibiotics. They helped a little bit. I couldn't get into the game in the backline. Michael Duignan came in and really tied up young McEvoy, thankfully."

As soon as he had shaken hands with the President in the pre-game ceremonies, Whelehan took a step back from the presentation line and swatted imaginary sliotars. From the stands he looked pumped. He was just trying to find his strength and adrenalin.

"I needed a good sweating to get it out of me and of course I wasn't going to get one until today.

"I felt weak at the start. My legs were a bit weak. When I went out on the field they went brittle. One of them things."

And for 20 minutes or so his game seldom rose from the sickbed. He conceded scores and chased forlornly and with his limp spirits Offaly's chances appeared to wilt.

"I won't blame the sickness. I just wasn't in the game. I didn't want to be drawn too far out the field, you know. I just wasn't on my game. Young McEvoy, in fairness, had a great game for them, especially when I was on him."

The move to the forwards worked like a tonic. It was the second time in this antic summer that he has made that novel journey. On each occasion his fortunes and those of his team have been reversed.

His presence lubricated the machinery of the Offaly forward line. For 20 minutes they had clanked and clunked and they tried to manufacture scores. Whelahan put himself at the centre of the process, first as an adventurous wing forward, then as a full forward.

"In fairness, I got one or two nice balls that got me into the game, and we seemed to move fairly well as a unit in the last 50 minutes of the game. The ball that our backs and midfield was hitting in was unbelievable. If I was left any longer I was only going to be a liability to the team. I was the weak in the first 20 minutes. They moved me and I thought if didn't go well up there I would have gone to the line."

It helped of course that Michael Duignan filled the gap as if he had been hurling there all his life. Yet Duignan must have gazed in wonder at some of the miracles which Whelahan produced as the game matured. He had a goal and three points from play but he was at the middle of almost everything which Offaly created and it was fouls on him which produced several of the dead ball scores which got Offaly back into the game.

"The ball was just breaking right for me," he said with flawless modesty "The first few balls that came up our way just fell into me. It was nice to be hitting a few at that stage. I got the first and I felt settled. I began to feel good up there. If I could get enough of the ball, I felt better. Thankfully in the second half a couple of great balls were sent in."

His influence culminated five minutes from time when Joe Errity slipped him a ball and he drove it to the Kilkenny net to effectively end the game as a contest. A unique experience for a man who has made his reputation as the best defender in the game.

"I was credited with a goal already this year but John Troy is having words about that. To score in an All-Ireland final is unbelievable. As a back being up in the forwards. I never would have thought it would happen. Too much pressure and hardship up there. I'll go back to the backs with the club."

By that stage of course he looked drained. With 10 minutes to go he could be seen standing near the line under the Hogan Stand bent over with his hands on his hips, searching for his second wind. He was carrying an injury by then which didn't help.

"I tore my hamstring in the second half. When I saw Darren Hanniffy coming in I thought I was being brought off because the hamstring was torn. But Johnny Dooley had a bad knock on the knee and he had to go off. It was one or the other of us."

If the goal was all that he had contributed to the game his appearance would have been noteworthy. Yet even during his struggles earlier he had made the interception which kept Offaly in the game.

"Yeah, I brought it down for PJ Delaney, in fact. Kevin Kinahan was committed the other way. I saw PJ on the edge of square. He pulled on the ball and Stephen Byrne was gone to one side. It wasn't travelling hard and thankfully I was able to get to it. We would have been six points down with no way back."

The team which won yesterday was filled with friends Whelahan has had since his childhood in Birr. He had flesh and blood on the field and on the bench. Barry Whelahan was a sub. Simon Whelahan the only man to break into Offaly's vaunted defence since their All-Ireland of 1994.

"Some year for Simon. He wasn't on the panel until three days before the Meath game. He has turned around now and in the last 50 minutes of an All-Ireland he has held up one of the best forwards of the game, Charlie Carter. I am just so thrilled for him."

In a county where the most talented hurlers seldom seem to have the appetite, Whelahan has raged against the bad years of underachievement like nobody else.

"We were trying this week to get the younger members to know the difference between winning and losing. Pat Fleury came and talked about 1984. Then we talked about 1995. The difference. I never want to experience it again.

One sequence from yesterday's game stayed with him and inspired him. Kilkenny huffing and frantic for a score in the second half. Offaly players throwing themselves in their path in a series of unlikely cameos of heroism.

"The blocking down in one passage where Simon ended up kicking it over the sideline, the blocking done in that passage would frustrate anyone. It was unbelievable. I think we blocked them four times. When the backs are playing like that, you know the other side are in trouble."

On his greatest day he insists on pushing the laurels elsewhere. Superhero stuff.