Michael Moynihan: Where do Limerick rank among hurling's greatest? The very top shelf

Can they create a category of their own? That’s a topic for next year. Enjoy this one first.

WINNERS: Gearóid Hegarty of Limerick celebrates a point during the GAA Hurling All-Ireland Senior Championship Final. Photo by Stephen McCarthy/Sportsfile

Passion and conquest attend upon them still.

Yeats was probable too busy mooning after Maud Gonne to pay much attention to the small ball, but the greats can always be repurposed. Limerick met the stiffest test and found an answer. Champions do that.

They collected a third All-Ireland title after a savagely contested final against Kilkenny, with the men in green pushed to the very limit and to the reddest of the clock’s red zones.

Rumour sprouts along Jones’ Road in the hours before every All-Ireland final — there’s some kind of strained joke possible here comparing July and September and flowering plants — and this game was no different. Between Gill’s Corner and the turnstiles a string of Limerick players were ruled out, ruled back in and ruled out again: when the two teams were announced without changes it almost came as a surprise.

(Pardon the focus on the preamble but it was an unusual All-Ireland morning, between the baking sun and bevy of tickets available; was there ever a more one-sided market in the bits of cardboard?) 

Limerick were careful, chatting in the last couple of weeks, when citing 2019, the two sides’ last meeting in the championship. The focus immediately afterwards was on the game’s controversial ending, when Limerick might have been awarded a match-levelling 65, but more than one Shannonsider mentioned their own sluggish start, when Kilkenny accelerated away from them.

That didn’t happen in this game: Limerick brought the pain early. Diarmaid Byrnes had them on the scoresheet quickly - not for the first time in this championship - and then came Gearóid Hegarty’s goal.

It was the chief ornament of that thunderous opening, with its mix of soft skills and venom: come for the powerful finish to the corner, but stay for the instantaneous pick-up in traffic. Hegarty added a couple of stupendous points and that hoary old metric was standing up well to repeated wear in Croke Park. Limerick got their scores easier.

Characteristically, however, Kilkenny dug in and survived. They harvested points from defenders and chiselled out chances and, of course, they had TJ Reid. Much of the challenge went through the veteran of a thousand battles, and with his metronomic free-taking - always, always whistling low over the bar - he kept his side in touch.

To borrow a phrase from the Rás Mór going in France, Kilkenny weren’t gone out the back of the peloton thanks to Reid’s familiar left-handed sweep: 1-17 to 0-16 at the break.

Three minutes after half-time substitute Walter Walsh set off on his trademark gallop down the right - taking a fair few steps as he did so, in fairness - and perturbed the imperturbable in the Limerick defence. When the ball broke to Billy Ryan, he found the net. Limerick pushed four ahead soon afterwards but the goal flooded the Kilkenny system with adrenaline: witness Walter Walsh’s point from the sideline.

No surprise, then, when Reid and Eoin Cody placed Martin Keoghan for a goal and sub John Donnelly levelled on 47 minutes. (Kudos to Cody for subverting the laws of geometry with his flick, by the way).

Here was the season. All the chips on the table with 23 minutes left, 2-19 to 1-22.

Limerick got the scores: Tom Morrissey found his range at precisely the right time, but Reid’s accuracy and another veteran, Richie Hogan, levelled matters heading into the final ten minutes.

Credit the All-Ireland champions, however, with that irresistible late surge. They enjoyed a bounce from their subs again, with Conor Boylan and Cathal O’Neill finding their range. Fittingly Gearóid Hegarty - unquestionably the man of the match - chipped in with an injury time score himself as they hit five points without a Kilkenny answer in the closing stages. The Cats’ subs answered even later, to cut Limerick’s lead to two, but it was too little too late.

Kilkenny won’t need to be told they lost nothing in defeat yesterday. Their urgency might have been their undoing - a few of those late shot selections were a tiny bit hasty, even allowing for the circumstances - but the experience banked by their younger cohort will pay dividends in future seasons.

"It was close at the end, for sure," said Brian Cody.  "We were playing the All-Ireland champions, according to most people’s predictions we weren’t at the level we needed to be at to even have a chance of getting to an All-Ireland final, but I think our players deserve fantastic admiration for the way they fought it out.

“The early goal gave them a huge boost, great confidence, and it gave them that cushion nearly the whole way, right up to half-time.

“They got some great scores, at half-time we were four points down, which is obviously not a big lead in hurling. We fought it out and fought it out and it was unfortunate we didn't get to where we wanted to get there.

“We congratulate Limerick as All-Ireland champions - three in a row champions, which is a huge achievement for them, and I think every Kilkenny person should be very proud of the way the Kilkenny team performed.” 

In the green and white corner Declan Hannon was still catching his breath after the game.

“Absolutely over the moon,” said the Limerick captain. “It was a titanic struggle at times to get over the line but it’s sheer elation now. It’s a dream come true every year but it’s true.

“A lot of time, effort and commitment goes into a day like today and it’s so special for our group - we’ve created something really strong in the last few years.

“I’m very proud of the boys and the way they dug deep there at the end - and we had to, because Kilkenny came at us with absolutely everything we tried to do for a finish.

“I’m over the moon for absolutely everybody, we were dealt a few blows throughout the year, and in the last week even with Cian (Lynch), the group just rallied together and it was nearly sheer stubbornness got us over the line."

Where do Limerick now rank in the pantheon of great sides?

On the very top shelf, in the very front rank.

Other questions? Can they create a category of their own or are other teams catching up with them? They needed extra time to win the Munster final and Kilkenny’s breath was hot on their necks in injury time in Croke Park.

That’s the small print. The truth is in the headline. And in the record books.