McIntyre: We had champions on ropes

I CAME, I saw, I conquered — the message from Julius Caesar to the Senate in Rome after his victory over Pharnaces to retake the Eastern Provinces in 47 BC, probably the most succinct message ever sent.

On Saturday, the Tribesmen of Galway crossed the Shannon to Tullamore in their bid to conquer another eastern province. John McIntyre, Galway’s Caesar, is another eloquent man, if not quite so succinct. They came, yes, they saw, yes, and though they didn’t conquer, they did strike a mighty blow against the All-Ireland champions and, in the process, sent a message to the rest of hurling.

“Any time you lose you’re disappointed, that’s what sport is all about, but that is as close as any team has got to Kilkenny in the last three years and that is something to build on.

“Kilkenny’s experience and their composure in the last 20 minutes definitely gave them an edge because we had them on the ropes — maybe a few of our players took the wrong options at the wrong time. I am very proud of the Galway players. It was a noble effort.”

The battle was lost only in the final quarter, when Kilkenny, using all their guile, went on a 10-point unanswered run, to turn a five-point deficit to a five-point lead. “That’s why they are All-Ireland champions,” said McIntyre.

“That’s why no team up to today has got close to them for three years. The reality is that it looked at one stage with three or four minutes to go that they might win by eight or 10 but in fairness to our lads, even reduced to 14 men, they got two points near the end. We will all learn from it, we have something to build on.”

“I didn’t realise it was a ten-point run,” Brian Cody said afterwards, “that’s fairly serous alright, scores of the highest quality, but I think it was more what we did when we were under pressure; we hung in there, didn’t allow them away – they got five points of a lead but it never went beyond that.

” Patience is vitally important, because five points of a lead is nothing in hurling — eight, nine points is nothing in hurling really. You keep at it – you keep hurling and keep doing the basics well. You believe in what you see in front of you and you just grind it out. But both teams ground it out, both teams deserve tremendous credit because Galway were outstanding there. They were capable, they were serious, coming at us in waves. Our panel was tested in a big way – it was a brilliant win for us.”