Cats keeping a close eye on the clock
Kilkenny v Dublin
Even when Kilkenny weren’t so much beating other teams a few years ago as cutting out their hearts without an anaesthetic. Especially when Kilkenny were, etc.
The man didn’t believe it, he couldn’t possibly have, but here was the important thing. He made damn sure his players did and they in turn hurled as if personally affronted that the other crowd had togged out and taken the field.
All those 2007-10 turkey shoots: they were turkey shoots not because Kilkenny disrespected their opponents but precisely because they did respect them. They never believed their own press cuttings, never forgot to pack their guns and ammo and never got careless on the job and ended up blowing off their own heads.
But now it has finally come to pass. Dublin draw with Kilkenny and Brian Cody can say he was right all along. Kilkenny needing an injury-time point to scrape a draw, indeed. We are well and truly into a realm where any team can beat any other team on a given day.
And what’s to say Dublin won’t be a better, more confident proposition tonight? At the very worst, they’ll hardly hit another 10 wides in the first half. Glass half-full for the underdogs or glass half-empty? Glass half full. Unequivocally.
But it’s not tonight that’s the problem for the MacCarthy Cup holders. It’s next weekend, whether against Galway or against Tipperary. And whatever weekends, if any, that remain to them afterwards.
They had an extra fixture this year, the quarter-final against Offaly, as it was. Now they’ve an extra fixture on top of that. Next weekend will mark their fourth outing in five weeks. Two years ago four outings sufficed to win them the All-Ireland.
That sound you hear in the background? It’s a clock ticking. Kilkenny aren’t so much trying to win matches at the moment as to stay in the championship until the dead — the Hurler of the Year, the Hurler of the Year before him, a brace of All Star-winning full-backs — arise from their beds and appear to many.
Even allowing for the fact they faced the wind against both Offaly and Dublin, they’re taking longer and longer to hit their stride and work up a rhythm. At their absolute peak, in 2008-09, they were capable of producing a withering burst at any stage of a game, as if on self-demand.
The opening 10 minutes, the five minutes before half-time, the 10 minutes after half-time, the final furlong. Shades of The Italian Job. When in doubt, blow the bloody doors off. They’re not yet reduced to making do with one of Michael Caine’s Minis. But Cody’s Ferrari has gone, as befits the recessionary age. These days Kilkenny drive a Volvo.
Of the 18 matches of the four in a row, they led at half-time in 17 and were level at half-time in the other (the 2007 All-Ireland quarter-final versus Galway). Of the last seven matches they’ve played, starting with last year’s Leinster final, they’ve led at half-time in only two, trailed at half-time in four and been level once (last Sunday).
To paraphrase Brendan Behan on theatre critics and eunuchs: they know how it’s done, they’ve done it themselves, but at this stage they can’t do it every night. Not any longer. Not at their age.
JJ Delaney will this evening play his 55th championship match, the third most capped Kilkenny player in history. Tommy Walsh will play his 49th and will shortly become only the seventh Kilkenny man to hit 50 appearances. Eoin Larkin is on 38, Jackie Tyrrell on 35, Richie Power on 33.
Another dynamic that’s altered concerns their point-scoring output. Points used to be their daily bread, their staff of life. But as the accompanying panel illustrates, Kilkenny no longer routinely outpoint the enemy. In three of their last seven outings they’ve failed to raise more white flags than the opposition.
In the most recent case last Sunday there were some very obvious contributory factors. No Henry. Eoin Larkin’s form plunge. And the ineffectiveness of Richie Power, the man who in Shefflin’s absence should be driving the bus.
The most naturally talented member of the panel, it as if Power is so radiantly gifted that things come too easily to him, that he never feels he has to reach inside himself for more. He was careless against Offaly and heard all about it from Cody afterwards. His substitution six days ago ought to have reinforced the message.
Kilkenny were mediocre in the first half and Dublin awful. Dublin were brisk and imaginative in the second half and Kilkenny dopey in the extreme. If a draw was just about a fair result, it was harsher on the underdogs than on the favourites.
Dublin’s decision to play seven at the back in the second half was tactical rather than strategic; the immediate and only aim was to guard against blood loss when Kilkenny produced a knife in the opening 10 minutes.
As it turned out, the reconfigured Dublin XV took on a life of their own.
Within two minutes of the restart it was patently clear they knew what kind of game they were playing — a function of having practised seven in defence and five up front for 10 minutes or so at the end of a training session every now and then.
Done well, as Dublin did it on Sunday, playing with seven defenders isn’t solely about getting bodies back. It’s also about channelling clean ball to the forwards, employing the width of the field and having runners prepared to steam through to take a pass. It is constructive, not destructive.
They may well go seven-and-five in the opening quarter tonight, in which case Kilkenny can’t say they weren’t warned. You’d imagine Cody’s boys will get there in the end as per usual. But still that background sound is audible.
Tick tock. Tick tock.
Kilkenny Kilkenny played 26 championship matches between 2005 and 2011 Their opponents scored more points in one match. 2009 All-Ireland final: Kilkenny 2-22 Tipperary 0-23. Their opponents scored the same number of points in two matches. 2005 All-Ireland semi-final: Kilkenny 4-18 Galway 5-18. 2009 Leinster final: Kilkenny 2-18 Dublin 0-18. Kilkenny have played eight championship matches in 2012-13 Their opponents scored more points in two matches. 2012 Leinster final: Kilkenny 2-11 Galway 2-21. 2013 Leinster semi-final: Kilkenny 1-14 Dublin 0-17 Their opponents scored the same number of points in one match. 2012 All-Ireland quarter-final: Kilkenny 4-16 Limerick 0-16
