Rebels inflict the final blow as Cats run out of lives

Cork are reborn but there was a finality about this defeat for Kilkenny. And Henry Shefflin.

Sporting stories so often end in failure. They almost have to. Zinedine Zidane’s last act as a footballer was to walk past the World Cup trophy after being red carded for head-butting Marco Materazzi.

Yesterday, in Thurles, Shefflin was sent off on 35 minutes by referee Barry Kelly for a second yellow card – the first for a chop on 10 minutes – having high-tackled Jamie Coughlan as the latter attempted to clear his lines. .

Following Cork’s 0-19 to 0-14 victory in this All-Ireland quarter-final, Brian Cody was livid, perplexed, disgusted.

“I couldn’t believe it to be honest,” said Cody. “I can’t understand it. People might be able to understand it, I don’t know.

“Referees are flashing yellow cards nowadays, it is gone mad altogether. But that’s the way they want it. That’s the way they like it.

“I’ve no idea why Henry Shefflin got two yellow cards. I know the second one was so clear to me, that there was a player falling down. His hurley was very, very low. When a player falls the hurl obviously ends up around his neck but Henry didn’t put the hurl up there, the person put his body down into it.”

But before Shefflin walked they were already in dire straits as Patrick Horgan’s resulting free made it 0-11 to 0-6. In truth, Cork devoured them, dominating all areas of play.

Moment after half-time Richie Power was denied a goal from a penalty by a brilliant double save by Cork goalkeeper Anthony Nash. Power soon went off due to concussion.

Listening to Cody afterwards, before the entire squad slipped en masse out the back door and away to Nowlan Park for the Bruce Springsteen gig, it sounded like the end.

The contest was done and dusted with 10 minutes to spare. Gone for 2013 but, as Cody conceded, the greatest team of all time and their best player may be gone for good.

“We’ve had success for a long, long time now and are now facing into what a lot of counties have been facing for a long, long time I suppose,” said Cody.

“They fought their way back into the game even when it was lost. Their heads never dropped. That’s the team that they have been and that they are. That’s the way sport goes. Today we were on the wrong end of it.

“There are certainly more seasons in them but the team obviously evolves and changes from year to year. But there are so many players up in that dressing room with huge careers ahead of them.”

And yourself, Brian?

“I won’t say anything about myself that’s for sure anyway.”

This story’s central character was Shefflin even if he was dominated by Tom Kenny, the only Cork player with an All-Ireland medal, and then killed off at the end of Act I. King Henry hadn’t been shooting the lights out, nor did he limp away with injury. He was red-carded for the first time in a 14 year championship career.

Jimmy Barry Murphy sensed they had already left the building, and what better opponent than their greatest to pass them into shadow.

“I suppose you could say there was signs of vulnerability because Dublin beat them in a replay,” said Barry Murphy. “I didn’t see that coming in a replay in particular and then Waterford ran them very close.

“It’s quite obvious Kilkenny are not the team they were. In fairness, no team can go on forever but it is very hard for us to come from that league final defeat last year and build up morale and get lads’ confidence up.”

That it was Cork who filleted them, having been primed by Dublin before bravely recovering to see off Tipperary and Waterford will hurt Kilkenny the most. There’s no other county left in the championship with such pedigree.

What we are left with is wonderfully unique All-Ireland semi-final pairings in Dublin versus Cork on August 11th and Limerick versus Clare on August 18th. The latter pair faced off in a Division Two final last year. Yesterday Clare punished Galway and a misfiring Joe Canning with 1-23 to 2-14 victory.

“That occasion in Dublin will be something special,” said Clare manager Davy Fitzgerald. “We look forward to it.

“I was coming down the road this morning, coming from the gym and I was driving down to meet the boys. I saw the Clare flags and the fellas togged out. It’s the first time in a long time I felt, this is great, that they’re going to do that.”

So Kilkenny join Tipperary on the 2013 scrap heap. All changed, changed utterly: A terrible beauty is born.

Now, will it be a Rebel beauty or something new entirely?