Cats dominate by ‘playing on the edge’, claims Canning

GALWAY wonderkid Joe Canning has admitted that Kilkenny’s ability to go “to the limit of the rules” is the reason for their dominance of the game.

Kilkenny have been subjected to repeated criticism for “playing on the edge” over the course of their three-year monopoly of the All-Ireland Championship, but Canning, who scored 2-9 in the Leinster semi-final defeat to the Cats on Saturday, says their physical approach is the template other teams must aspire to.

“They take it to the limit and that’s why they’re champions. You have to push yourself to the limit of the rules and fair play to them, you have to respect them for that as well,” said Canning, who was speaking at the launch of Get Your Back Up, a public awareness campaign for Ankylosing Spondylitis, a painful spinal and pelvic ailment which typically hits young people.

The 20-year-old Portumna clubman says the other top teams in the country – Tipperary and Cork – have followed Kilkenny’s lead and adopted a more physical approach to the game.

Galway, however, have always been pigeon-holed as a pure hurling team incapable of mucking it out in the trenches, a label Canning feels the Tribesmen finally managed to shed in the four-point defeat to the Cats.

“A lot of people think we’re kind of a soft touch. In years gone past Galway were just a nice hurling team and not when it came down to brass tacks they weren’t able to physically match it with the best,” he added.

“With the likes of Tipperary, Cork, you have to match them toe-to-toe and that’s a thing that we have to improve on even more now.

“As you saw the other night we weren’t good enough because we didn’t win.”

Under Brian Cody, the Cats have won six All-Ireland titles and have assumed an air of invincibility, but Canning is convinced that they will eventually be beaten by a team that manages to compete with them in the physical stakes.

“I think if you want to beat them you have to put it up physically. You can’t just sit back and let them run all over you. It’s a thing that there’s a difference between over physical [approach] and just being fair on the ball.

“That’s a thing we try to do, not to concede as much frees as possible. We did that fairly well but they took a lot of scores from out the field from breaking ball that we didn’t pick up on as well. There were a few silly mistakes on our behalf.”

Meanwhile, Canning has warned that Clare will be dangerous opponents in the All-Ireland Qualifiers on July 11. Clare have a favourable record in border battles between the west coast rivals, with the Banner having beaten a Ger Loughnane-managed Galway at the same stage in 2007.

“It is a big rivalry. Over the last 11 championship games I think we’ve only won two so that’s a huge thing for us to try to increase that obviously to three,” Canning continued.

“It’s tough going down to Ennis, it’s their home patch as you know.

“It’s almost like Munster at Thomond Park – they very rarely lose there in championship games. It’s going to be very hard to get a good performance there.

“It took them a while to get into the match against Tipp but when they did it they were flying. Because Tipp are so good they maybe slackened off a bit but had the composure to finish out the game.”