Last Sunday’s epic draw between Kilkenny and Clare was just the latest instalment of what is turning out to be a great hurling year…

Pete Finnerty - for once - made some sense on the Sunday Game when he dismissed Pat Spillane’s attempts to denigrate the standard of hurling, especially in the first half. A defender himself, Finnerty pointed out that good hurling is not just about flowing passages of play and lovely scores, but also about dogged defence, hooking and blocking and generally getting in the other fellow’s way.

A few weeks ago Spillane offered the view that there is no place for tactics or game plans in hurling. One presumes he no longer has this view after last Sunday’s clash. Anthony Daly’s decision to play Alan Markham as a sweeper behind the Clare halfback line was a calculated risk, designed to prevent Kilkenny’s half forwards from embarking on their characteristic defence-splitting solo runs. From this point of view, the tactic worked a treat, in large measure because Markham filled the role superbly – in the process giving by far his best ever display in a Clare jersey.

The other side of the coin was that the ploy meant Kilkenny also had a loose man at their end of the field to perform a similar role for the Cats, and to give him his due, James Ryall also turned in a stirring display. Presumably Daly’s view was that it would be better to win a low-scoring game by a point than to lose by six points in a high-scoring extravaganza. And his gamble almost came off, helped in great measure by Tommy Walsh’s dismissal which removed Kilkenny’s loose man and created the space for Tony Griffin to create havoc after the change of ends.

Walsh was somewhat unlucky, in that the offence for which he got his first yellow card was rather innocuous, and possibly not a free at all. To add to Kilkenny’s sense of grievance, the foul which Walsh committed on Griffin occurred outside the large square. One wonders why referees do not consult with their umpires before making crucial decisions on matters like this. An Moltóir was very doubtful at the time about the wisdom of bringing up Davy Fitzgerald to take the penalty, as Niall Gilligan has recently been showing quite a penchant for notching goals from close-in frees.

Too many players seem to think that the best way to score a goal from a free is to hit the ball as hard as you can in the general direction of the goal. However, any ball coming in between knee and shoulder height is easy enough to stop. The most effective shots are those aimed above the head (even if the defenders get a stick to them, they invariably go over the bar) or at the ground immediately in front of the defenders – which is precisely the shot produced by Gilligan for Clare’s second penalty.

Referee Ger Harrington was correct in awarding the latter penalty. When Griffin got the ball first, Noel Hickey pulled across him twice from behind before he went to ground and got up to stroke the ball to the net. However, Harrington generally had a bad day out, missing several clear fouls and giving frees when no foul was apparent. He was wrong to pull DJ Carey for over-carrying the ball early in the second half – and the thump Alan Markham gave Carey in the back when he was on the ground was a nasty piece of work which should not (but undoubtedly will) go unpunished. Harrington also gave Clare what could have been a crucial free for a non-existent foul on Colin Lynch in front of the Cusack Stand late in the game when Lynch himself should have been penalised for over-carrying.

By the same token, Richie Mullally, who had already been booked, should have walked for his late challenge on Olly Baker which earned Clare a late free. The same fate should have befallen James Ryall for a pull across Tony Griffin shortly afterwards, but Harrington didn’t even give a free – possibly because, as Michael Duignan suggested in the TV commentary, he knew he would have had to send Ryall off if had done so.

In terms of overall territorial possession, the game was as evenly balanced as the final score suggests. In total, Clare played the ball (apart from frees) to effect 145 times to Kilkenny’s 142. Not surprisingly, Alan Markham was way ahead of everyone else in the number of plays with 23. What may surprise some is that the player who came second to Markham was Ken Coogan with 17 plays (12 in the first half). Three other Kilkenny players were in double figures – James Ryall, Peter Barry and JJ Delaney (with 14 each). By contrast, Clare had six players beside Markham in double digits – Seanie and Diarmuid McMahon (12 each), Anthony Carmody and Jamesie O’Connor (11 each) and Gerry Quinn and Tony Griffin (10 each).

For a player who only came on after 20 minutes, O’Connor’s contribution was crucial, not just in terms of the number of times he got on the ball, but the superb quality of his distribution which led directly to several scores, including the penalty goal. A big plus for the Banner was Ger O’Grady’s superb first half, when he played the ball eight times. Colin Lynch had what was for him a relatively quiet game, with just eight plays in total. However, he did come into the game strongly towards the end.

It is instructive that James McGarry was much busier than Davy Fitzgerald in general play (nine plays to three), reflecting the fact that the Kilkenny goal was under much more pressure than Clare’s, especially in the second half. Davy’s relatively quiet day at the office was largely due to the paucity of possession won by the Kilkenny full forwards who, in the first half, played the ball just once each. What further justification is needed for Anthony Daly’s tactics? O’Grady’s obliteration of Eddie Brennan led to the latter’s replacement at the interval. Presumably the fact that Jimmy Coogan’s single play was to strike a point saved his bacon, but he still managed to play the ball just one more time in the second half. By contrast, DJ Carey upped his performance considerably in the second half when he played the ball eight times, albeit only after he moved out the field in a swap with Henry Sheflin who, once again, kept the Kilkenny ship afloat with his ability to get scores from limited possession and his prowess from frees.

The other major failure for the Cats was wingback Richie Mullally who played the ball just three times in all before being replaced near the end. Team captain Martin Comerford was also largely ineffectual, especially after the change of ends, when he played the ball just two times. Those who hold the view that Kilkenny have too many forwards who go missing when pressure is applied, and that they would be sunk entirely if they were to lose the services of Henry Sheflin, certainly got plenty of supporting evidence in Croke Park on Sunday.

There is very little one can say about the other quarter final. The Antrim players appeared to have generally good ball control skills, but their field craft was virtually non-existent and their shooting was way off. From the amount of chances they created, they should have got at least 15 or 16 points, which would have been a respectable enough score. Presumably they would have put the same chances away blindfold in training sessions. With Dunloy failing to deliver in Croke Park twice in a row after impressive semi-final victories in the club championship, one suspects that Antrim’s biggest problem is not lack of match practice but lack of big match temperament.

It was also both disappointing and surprising to see the Antrim players repeatedly attempting to run with the ball instead of playing a quick ball game. The result was that they were continuously being hooked, blocked and bottled up, with little good ball going into the full forward line. One presumes that this was entirely foreign to the type of approach Dinny Cahill was trying to instill in training. It must be very frustrating for all concerned, give