Cats' 2010 vintage may be best yet

ALL-IRELAND SHC SEMI-FINAL:I thought Kilkenny had hit their peak in August 2008, but no – they reached fresh eights again yesterday, writes NICKY ENGLISH

I KNOW when you come to an All-Ireland semi-final you’d want things to be a little more exciting than this, a close game, with at least some degree of uncertainty. And maybe it is a sad day for hurling when an All-Ireland semi-final is over before half-time. But Kilkenny were just such a joy to watch here. I’ve said before that this is the best hurling team I’ve ever witnessed and this performance simply underlines that.

If anything, they’ve stepped it up again to another level, as unbelievable as that sounds.

I also said before the game I did think Kilkenny were a better team this year, playing more uninhibited hurling. And we got absolute confirmation of that here too, with an amazing performance even by Kilkenny’s standards. The 2010 vintage may well be the best yet.

For the first 10 or 15 minutes it looked as if Cork were coping okay. Their full-back line was doing alright, and Donal Óg Cusack was doing well in goal and, as it turned out, did better than anyone to stem the Kilkenny onslaught. Richie Power was called for over-carrying early on. That brought a celebratory roar from Eoin Cadogan, which of course was hugely premature.

But Kilkenny weren’t racking up the scores as quickly as they usually do, and that had to give Cork some hope, and boosted the possibility that we may have a competitive game here.

Then that possibility disappeared in the space of maybe five minutes. Kilkenny were suddenly completely dominant.

Brian Hogan was outstanding at centre back and had Kieran Murphy bottled up completely. Michael Fennelly was awesome, covering ground like a cheetah, and beside him Cha Fitzpatrick was lording things too. I can never remember Tom Kenny being more anonymous for Cork, and Cathal Naughton was played out of it too. This had been one of Cork’s most effective lines all summer, and yet here they were marked completely absent. Both men were actually replaced.

After Kilkenny’s first goal the game was suddenly over. They were developing attacks from everywhere, that 20 minutes before half-time was the best display I’ve ever seen from this Kilkenny team. I thought maybe Kilkenny had hit their peak in August 2008, but no. They reached fresh heights again here, unbelievable heights. Every one of the Kilkenny team was motoring, and at 2-12 to 0-5 at half time, there was no way back for Cork.

I mean what could Denis Walsh say at half-time? The big question about this Cork team was how much their apparent under-preparations of recent years disguised their apparent decline. We got our answer here because clearly now this Cork team has gone well into a decline.

It has to be the end of the line for a few more of these great Cork players, and the big worry is the replacements don’t seem to be coming through.

Noel Hickey had Aisake Ó hÁilpín in his traps, obliterated him. And Cork couldn’t get a ball past him. Having Hickey perform like that is a big positive for Kilkenny, and frees up JJ Delaney to play on the wing. Cork’s half back line, so often the rock of their performance, was clearly found wanting and further up the field Niall McCarthy tried hard, although mainly in vain.

In the end they reverted to the short-passing game of a few years back, but the physical prowess that allowed them do it is now gone. They were reduced to taking some long-range points, but they never really chased down the goals they needed.

It was a sorry sight.

The only obvious concerns for Kilkenny are the injuries to Henry Shefflin and Brian Hogan. Shefflin seemed to land very awkwardly on his knee and must be a doubt for the All-Ireland final, and it will be sad if the man who has contributed so much to the drive for five were to miss out. Hogan is a big loss too if he doesn’t make it because Kilkenny aren’t quite as well covered in defence as they are in attack. But their strength really is their depth, and we saw that again here, with players like Martin Comerford and Michael Rice coming on.

Still, the loss of Shefflin and Hogan would deplete those reserves quite noticeably. My hope is Shefflin does make it back for the All-Ireland because he certainly deserves to be there.

But the strength of the panel is incredible, when you consider Rice would have been first choice in midfield only for his injury. Instead “Cha” stepped up in a big way, and that proves all the talk about players wanting their places so badly, and having to earn them.

As the game wore on, Richie Power got better and better too and could have had a couple more goals. I always felt he would be a key player if they were to achieve the five-in-a-row and everything about his game right now suggests that he will. What it all means is Kilkenny have landed themselves back in another All-Ireland final in even better shape than last year.

Tipperary and Waterford will have good cut at each next Sunday and then hopefully go into the final prepared to play the same uninhibited game as Kilkenny, and hope maybe Kilkenny suffer from stage fright or something. That looks highly unlikely based on what we’ve just witnessed in Croke Park.