THE ONFIELD HANDSHAKES and jersey swaps were still going on when the RTÉ panel were making the pronouncements, this day ten years ago.
Tipperary and Kilkenny’s first-ever draw in championship hurling was one to be savoured. A stone-cold classic. The best-ever hurling All Ireland final, asked Michael Lyster?
Liam Sheedy, Cyril Farrell and Tomás Mulcahy enthusiastically agreed.
“It was a privilege for us to be sitting here,” Farrell purred.
Even allowing for the ultimate recency bias of a few minutes hence, the various components to measure a game’s worth and entertainment value were being spat across the studio.
A 3-22 to 1-28 scoreline. 62 points combined. At the time it was the highest-scoring All Ireland final across 70 minutes plus time added on.
The biggest score before that was Cork 6-21 Wexford 5-10 (64 points) in the 1970 final, an 80-minute game.
Other details unfolded. In both teams, the two midfielders and six starting forwards scored from play. Kilkenny midfielder Conor Fogarty scored his first ever championship point, even after missing two earlier attempts.
Add in Tipperary defenders Paddy Stapleton and Michael Cahill and substitute Jason Forde who also got the brackets after their name.
Tipperary could have won it. And yet they would have stolen it.
Kilkenny should have seen the game out, with Tipp hitting the last three scores to snatch the draw. Was that a black mark against them? What did they deserve when they faded so badly in the closing moments?
Let’s revisit the big moments for a bit. The first fifteen minutes the sides were level six times.
The first goal arrived on 21 minutes; Tipp goalkeeper Darren Gleeson launching his delivery, Patrick ‘Bonner’ Maher catching it above Brian Hogan and letting his shot off. Kilkenny goalkeeper Eoin Murphy got a touch, but not enough to stop it spinning into the net.
A minute later, and Bonner was rampant. He charged for goal, bucking and leaping with Paul Murphy desperately trying to slow him. Eventually they both go down. The challenge started outside the area, but took ultimate effect inside. Penalty.
Seamus Callanan drove his shot into the turf and it was a handy save for Eoin Murphy to make.
Three minutes after that, Paul Murphy lets in a ball that TJ Reid fields. He handpasses to Richie Power who feathers a little touch over the onrushing Gleeson, to leave a tap to the net.
That was the pace set. It barely let up. Tipp got another penalty and entrusted Bubbles with it, but it was again saved. Kilkenny added goals in the second half through Power again, and Reid.
For all that, the final play was everything.
On 67 minutes and 53 seconds, John ‘Bubbles’ O’Dwyer scooped up a ball under pressure from Eoin Larkin trying to get a hook on in the corner of the Hogan Stand and Canal End. He nailed it to tie the game.
Richie Hogan went down with cramp, causing a brief delay. Eoin Murphy had the ball pucked out at 68:40. Aidan ‘Taggy’ Fogarty hoovered up the loose ball and sent it towards Hill 16. Paddy Stapleton emerged with it and sent his clearance down the Cusack Stand wing. Bonner Maher missed his pick. JJ Delaney handpassed back to Paul Murphy who cleared down the same line. Phew!
It broke among a forest of hurls to Kieran Bergin who launched it again on the same wing. There’s a scrap on the ground and Callanan got to it and struck off his left side but it bounced harmlessly to Eoin Murphy. Phew!
Murphy gets all his might behind it. It briefly looked as if Henry Shefflin – who only came on at 66 minutes (“Brian Cody doesn’t do sentiment. It’s not about individuals,” Ger Canning helpfully suggests as the camera cut repeatedly to a frustrated looking Shefflin throughout the second half), but Stapleton got his body in the road and Mickey Cahill cleared. Phew!
Only, there was nothing scientific about his strike. He had a glance down the Cusack Stand wing and there was nothing on, so he spun inside and walloped it low and across the pitch.
Almost right at the midfield pitch marking, Brian Hogan collected and took off. He ran at Pádraic Maher and a collision happens.
Charging? Sort of. Maybe. Seen them given.
And that’s exactly what Barry Kelly does. Free! For Tipp! Charging! The time on the clock is now 69.49. Phew!
The free was taken by Bubbles, the cleanest striker on the Tipp team. Tipp selector Michael Ryan runs on and has a quick word. Kelly tells O’Dwyer to take the ball back a couple of steps.
It’s fairly central. It’s 97 metres out. The added time is one minute. When Bubbles lifts the ball, it’s 70.53. He takes aim, fires, and the Tipperary crowd goes mental.
“He strikes it high! He’s put it o….” says Canning, before checking himself.
Kelly brings it to Hawkeye for adjudication. And it’s ruled wide.
The game finishes. The stadium exhales.
And at the end of all that, poor oul Barry Kelly barely got a mention for his role. Brian Cody will make up for that after the replay a few weeks later after Kilkenny win.
How does it stand up, ten years on? It’s impossible to qualify, but some statistics from the game a decade ago speak of a game that just isn’t played anymore.
There were 11 blocks by Tipp and 14 by Kilkenny. In the tackle count, Tipperary managed 85 and were bested by the Cats’ 91.
18 times, a Tipperary hand caught a contested catch. 21 for Kilkenny.
In pass completion, Tipp were at 84%, Kilkenny a slight margin ahead at 85%.
If and when Brian Cody might have reviewed those numbers, you suspect he might have thought that stats are all a big cod, and we know the one stat that matters.
As impressive as the passing accuracy might seem, it’s much higher now. Teams stand off their markers now. Puckouts are low and space is generated so that there are virtually no contests.
There are also far more passes. The platform of Eamon O’Shea’s coaching philosophy had taken root in 2009 and 2010, crisp passing and movement being highly sought-after aspects of play.
All the same, the 2014 final featured Seamus Callanan standing on the edge of the Kilkenny square, and TJ Reid down the other end.
JJ Delaney and Pádraic Maher were tested several times in the air as the ball was flung indiscriminately in that direction. Tipp also had to contend with the surprise inclusion of Walter Walsh.
Have Limerick, with Paul Kinnerk and John Kiely, changed everything, or just refined these methods? A bit of both. They will look for a clean puckout. They will work the ball through the lines and recycle out the back.
Yes, it’s nice to have Seamus Flanagan and Aaron Gillane inside, but the deliveries are far more often 70/30 in favour of the forward than 50/50.
With defeat to Cork in this year’s All Ireland semi – another contender for best-ever game in the immediate aftermath, Cork under Pat Ryan flipped the whole thing again.
Equipped with awesome power and conditioning, Limerick have worn teams down in the contact zone. Cork did something else completely. In the entire game, how many times was there a ruck for the ball?
Twenty? 15? A dozen? Surely not?
Twice. Only twice was the ball scrapped for on the ground. Cork played as fast as they could and got as many shots off as possible. The talk was that Limerick didn’t mind missing a few. Cork pushed that logic to the limit.
As per the statistics compiled on that game by the journalist Christy O’Connor, the first 12 shots took six minutes and 38 seconds; a shot every 33 seconds.
The pace couldn’t stay so high, but it hardly dropped off much either. In all, there were 99 shots. The average? A shot every 46 seconds. Incredible.
As remarkable as the record-breaking score was in 2014, it has been broken since. By 2016, there were 61 points between the same two teams.
In 2021, Limerick and Cork mustered up 66 points, but the Treatymen routed the Rebels by 16.
A year later, Limerick and Kilkenny reached 66 again.
Even this year, the figure was 60 at the end of normal time between Cork and Clare. The incredible thing was that only 0-5 of Clare’s entire tally came from placed ball with Aidan McCarthy converting three frees, a ‘65’ and Peter Duggan lofting over a sideline cut.
It seems most years now we are being asked, or asking ourselves if the big games are the best we have ever seen? There is also an abstract view that the occasion lends itself to players, that while operating within prescribed tactics, they still manage to lose themselves in total abandon.
All of this is backed up with a forensic coaching culture, and there’s an input of technology in terms of the equipment players use with hurleys and sliotars, as well as the physical conditioning to perform this standard of hurling.
Best ever final?
Best to heed the words of Christy Ring.
“Let no one say the best hurlers belong to the past. They are with us now and better yet to come.”
