New Premier belief could tip balance

It’s not the convention in this line of work to quote other journalists, but a tweet during the week from one of the press box regulars summed up Semple Stadium last Sunday so nicely that the only sensible course of action was to do a magpie on it (for the record, I asked him if I could. Fire away, he said).

Although he loved being in Croke Park last September for Clare and Cork, our friend made sure to acknowledge “there’s something Old Testament about Kilkenny/Tipp that stirs the soul”. Exactly. Six national finals in six seasons, two of them ending in extra-time, three more of them still alive as the 70th minute arrived. The only thing that will prevent nine-volume literary masterpieces being devoted to the subject is, of course, the win/loss split. And lo, once more the tribe of the Tippites were smitten by the host of Brian, and great was the weeping and gnashing of teeth.

It is painful enough to be well beaten in a final. It is infinitely more painful to be slightly the better team and still be beaten, as was the case here. Eamon O’Shea has been vociferously protective of his team of late and at pains to emphasise their character. Ignore the temptation to dive for the Mandy Rice-Davies response – well, he would say that, wouldn’t he? — and reflect that the evidence bears him out. Tipperary may have lost three big matches to Kilkenny in the past 12 months but they didn’t lose any of them on the grounds of lack of character.

There’s even a case to be made that they emerged from Sunday with more positives than their opponents did. By the 28th minute seven of their front eight had scored from play; they have an abrasive midfield duo; they have two promising young forwards in John O’Dwyer and Niall O’Meara, who hit 1-5 between them; and they have Bonner Maher, who was back to his busy, troublesome, unclassical best. Maher can gird himself for sore ankles this summer. Best way to stop Tipp? Stop Bonner taking the sliotar to hand.

Darren Gleeson shouldn’t be condemned for going short from that late free. Such is the nature of the game O’Shea wants them to play, and Gleeson’s error lay in the execution rather than the intention. Still, it was a lapse that underscored Henry Shefflin’s wisdom in taking his point from the penalty against Galway in the 2012 All-Ireland final. At that stage of a thriller it’s not about being a hero; it’s about making sure the other guy can’t be a hero.

Tipperary did the more precise hurling. Kilkenny went back to old habits in the second half, lumping the ball forward high and straight at the earliest opportunity. More than once Shefflin was to be seen wind-milling his hands at his defenders, encouraging them to keep the sliotar wide. In the age of Davy Fitz’s Clare such an approach is throwback stuff. And the reinvention of Brendan Maher as a sweeper centre-back suggests Tipp are currently better prepared for coping with the All-Ireland champions than are Kilkenny.

Yet the very fact they performed so well and lost has implications that cannot be ignored. Next time they play Kilkenny and find themselves a couple of points ahead with 10 minutes left, what happens? Do they seize up, afraid of winning, and wait for Kilkenny to beat them on the line because beating them is what Kilkenny nearly always do? Or do they find it within themselves to kick on? If the latter, how? Kieran McGeeney is about to earn his stipend.

All told, there was little for the rest of the country to be frightened of last Sunday. A reprise of the thunderous, nasty, epic league final of 2009 it wasn’t. That was five years and a different landscape ago, a ground shaking collision of teams you just knew would meet again in September. Last year’s final was a clash of teams we thought would meet again in September and were badly wrong about. This was merely a clash of two teams who might meet in September, but nothing more than that.

The usual modern classic between the pair, then, with the usual result. With one slight difference: for once Tipp did everything but win the damn thing. For the moment, that’ll have to suffice. Yea, verily.