HENRY SHEFFLIN WAS left frustrated at Galway’s underperformance in yesterday’s Leinster hurling final defeat to Kilkenny. 

The five-point Kilkenny victory was built on a dogged defence, savage work-rate and the free-taking of TJ Reid.

Galway were unusually subdued, had just five scorers and only two (Conor Whelan and Brian Concannon) hit the target more than once from open play. 

“Disappointment is the over-riding emotion,” said Shefflin. “It was a disappointing result but more so, a very disappointing performance.

“That’s probably the thing that hurts the most because if you go out and you lose a big game, but you perform to somewhat close to your capabilities, you don’t feel too bad.

“It was a very poor game, obviously Kilkenny are going to be delighted, but for the neutral watching that game it was stop start, it never got any flow in it whatsoever. There was no pattern of play, we’d no punch up front, apart from Conor Whelan obviously, who was hurting them a little bit.

“But it’s hard to put into words because we didn’t see this coming. We performed fairly well in the round robin, we topped the group and probably should have had all the points.

“There was a good energy about us, there was good work rate, there was good intent in everything we did, there was intensity all over the place, and training has been good the last couple of weeks.

“So I definitely felt that we’d get a performance. Whether it was going to be good enough, that was going to be down to Kilkenny, but that just never happened. That’s the over-riding emotion, that disappointment.”

Galway butchered a number of goal chances while Kilkenny’s best source of scoring was through placed balls, many of which Reid engineered himself by plucking ball from the sky.

“I think TJ got twelve from frees. James Owens never really let it flow, but we were probably making it easy for him to make decisions by being just, off it. You’re off it on the ball, you’re off it on the ball, and when you go into tackles, if you’re off it, your hands are high, it’s making it easy. So that was the way it went.

“Even with 45, 50 minutes gone, Kilkenny are a couple of points up, you’re kind of waiting for Galway to come and they just never came.

“That’s a reflection of Kilkenny as well to be fair, they did their defensive duties very well and they were just getting into the breaks better than ourselves.

“I think the two wing backs got a point each, Cianan (Fahy) got two points from the wing, and Conor Cooney got one point from play and that was it. That’s never going to be good enough to win.

“That was the kind of match it was, there was no flow. We had a couple of changes early on, a goal might have given us a bit of confidence, but we just weren’t at it.”

Galway will now face the winners of Antrim and Cork in the All-Ireland quarter-finals on 18 June. 

“Truthfully, if we perform like that against any team in two weeks’ time, we will not win,” said Shefflin.

“So it’s hurting tonight, hurt tomorrow, and then you just get back on to the training field next week, and you need to bring that hurt to your performance because we can talk and say all the words that you want to, but you just have to perform when the white ball is thrown in.”

Kilkenny players celebrate with the cup. Bryan Keane / INPHO Bryan Keane / INPHO / INPHO

Kilkenny boss Brian Cody was thrilled to see his side complete the Leinster three-in-a-row. He insisted their round-robin defeat in Salthill earlier was not used as a source of motivation heading into the final.

“To be Leinster champions is a huge achievement for the players and also the added bonus of getting straight to the All-Ireland semi-finals so it’s a great night for Kilkenny, that’s for certain.

“We lost in Salthill by a point. Kilkenny have gone to Salthill and Croke Park many times over the years and always found Galway a really serious challenge and come out on the wrong side of it at different times.

“We lost the game, of course we were disappointed to lose the game, but you don’t need that extra kind of motivation to go ahead and compete and try and win the Leinster final. That’s all there for ya, it’s worth going after.”

Cody responded to criticism that Kilkenny haven’t had a “settled team” this season.

“I’m always saying about the quality of our panel, everybody is not kind of absolutely thrilled about our team or anything else and people talk about why haven’t we a settled team, I’ve never in my life been concerned about having a settled 15.

“We have a settled panel, a settled attitude and a settled spirit, and that’s very strong and was proven tonight – we can bring in players or leave out players and it doesn’t change the potential in our team.”

The Cats have a four-week gap until the All-Ireland semi-finals.

“I’m happy to have the four week break at this stage because it has been very intense and very little time for training at all from the point of view of working at things in training and just building a whole sense of being ready for the challenge.

“We have that opportunity now, use the time to recover and really prepare well.”