WHATEVER about the quality of the match – and it wasn’t the classic generally forecast – let no-one be in any doubt about the quality of this Ballyhale Shamrocks team, nor their right today to call themselves the best hurling club in Ireland.

WHATEVER about the holders ‘leaving it behind them’, as manager Pat Joe Whelahan suggested afterwards, the relative ease with which Ballyhale Shamrocks built up an eight points lead in the first-half undoubtedly inspired their sixth AIB Leinster Club hurling title win in Nowlan Park yesterday.

FIVE minutes into the second-half of the second Kilkenny SHC semi-final in yesterday’s double-header at Nowlan Park, it looked like a shock (pardon the pun) was on the cards as Carrickshock took a surprise if well-merited one-point lead.