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Henry Shefflin finds chinks in Treaty armour that Brian Cody and Cats can exploit

Eamonn Sweeney

Brian Concannon wheels away in celebration after scoring Galway's goal against Limerick. Photo: Piaras Ó Mídheach/Sportsfile

July 04 2022 02:30 AM

Limerick are stumbling their way toward the record books. John Kiely’s team will enter the final as hot favourites to win the county’s first ever All-Ireland hat-trick but they’ve never looked more vulnerable.

This is not the Limerick of 2020 or 2021. The pack is gaining fast. For the third game on the trot the champions were pushed all the way by outsiders.

Clare could have won the Munster final. Galway should have won this All-Ireland semi. Henry Shefflin was a study in frustration as his side threw the game away by shooting 19 wides.

The greatest player of modern times received a cruel lesson in the limitations of a manager’s role. What Galway needed with the outcome in the balance was a Shefflin on the pitch rather than on the sideline.

When the underdogs drew level with three minutes remaining, the game was there for the taking. Instead a trio of injury-time wides helped blow their big opportunity.

Limerick kept their nerve. Their ability to edge close games is very impressive. After all, they haven’t had much practice in recent years.

Their progress to the final is oddly reminiscent of the hat-trick-seeking Cork team’s run back in 2006. Surviving one close shave after another, the Rebels were lauded as the ultimate winning machine.

We forgot to wonder why the shaves were so close. In that year’s final an underdog Kilkenny side engineered a shock which ushered in their imperial phase under Brian Cody. Eight titles in 10 years lay ahead.

Could another Cody ambush be in the offing? The idea would have seemed absurd when the Cats limped through the Leinster round-robin. Yet the first half of Saturday’s semi-final win over Clare saw an ominous return to the old machine-like precision and imperious confidence.

It’s a long time since Kilkenny have looked so Kilkenny. There was a real ‘we haven’t gone away, you know’ vibe about the demolition job being so ruthlessly perpetrated.

Cody has caught Kiely on the hop before. Only for Kilkenny’s smash-and-grab heist in the 2019 semi-final, Limerick would be seeking five in a row in a fortnight’s time.

When the champions unleashed the most dominant performance in final history last year it was almost impossible to imagine them being seriously challenged in the foreseeable future.

Yet this year’s rocky road toward glory might make a fourth All-Ireland their most impressive achievement of all. The one thing Limerick lacked in the past two years was serious opposition. Now a horde of pretenders are queuing up.

Limerick have been tagged, they’ve been staggered and they’ve seemed ready to hit the canvas. But in the last round they’ve bounced off the ropes, come out swinging and put in the kind of late rally which earns great champions a close decision.

This new resilience will add to their legend. As will their new knack for finding different routes to victory.

Being a Limerick sub used to be fun. It was a power without responsibility kind of gig. Come on when the victory procession has already started and tag on a couple of flashy points.

Not this year. Yesterday David Reidy filled the same kind of role his namesake Fairclough once did for Liverpool. Within a minute of his introduction, he was landing a point to restore Limerick’s lead as the endgame approached.

Two minutes from the end of normal time he put them ahead again and five minutes later edged them two clear. All were pressure scores of the kind Galway couldn’t summon up when the need was greatest.

The NBA have an annual Sixth Man of the Year award. Reidy, who also came up trumps late in the Munster final, would deserve the honour if hurling did something similar for its great replacements.

A super sub may be quite continental but a superstar is a team’s best friend. Perhaps envious of the impressive physiques revealed by Magic Mike Casey and his defensive comrades after the Munster final, Aaron Gillane built his own muscles by putting the team up on his back yesterday.

The Galway full-back line did little wrong. They didn’t need to. The majority of Gillane’s six points from play would have been beyond most forwards.

A tiny amount of space and a quick glance were enough to guarantee the ball would zip between the posts as though guided by some breakthrough remote control device jointly funded by JP McManus and Bill Murray.

Reidy and Gillane’s contributions were so vital because Gearóid Hegarty and Tom Morrissey have rarely been quieter.

Both were subbed as was Darragh O’Donovan with Limerick’s midfield again relatively subdued.

Gillane has never been more important to Limerick. That’s why the most crucial battle in the final could be between him and Mikey Butler. On Saturday, the Kilkenny kid added the scalp of Tony Kelly to his growing collection.

There hasn’t been a better debut season by a corner-back since Brian Corcoran’s arrival 30 years ago.

Add in the old-school command of Huw Lawlor and the extreme diligence of Tommy Walsh and there’s a suspicion of greatness about Kilkenny’s full-back line.

They also have three elite forwards, TJ Reid, Eoin Cody and Adrian Mullen, hitting top form. And while Limerick look like five years on the road is beginning to catch up on them, Kilkenny appear to be just getting into their stride.

It could be a lot tougher for Limerick to win the final than anyone would have expected at the start of the season. Three-in-a-rows are hard to manage. That’s why there’s been only three in the last 60 years.

In this year’s final the manager responsible for two of those will try to ensure that three remains the magic number.

Henry Shefflin finds chinks in Treaty armour that Brian Cody and Cats can exploit

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