Hurling shocked into life

So, hurling has kept all its surprises till the closing paragraphs of a prosaic season. This weather-abused weekend was the first which hurling has had to itself all summer and the games provided controversy and shock rather than beauty, and two refereeing performances each as odd as the other in their own ways.

On Saturday Tipperary prevailed against Wexford in a game which was strangled in infancy by over-zealous refereeing. Tipperary's Brian O'Meara and Wexford's Liam Dunne were sent to the line by Pat Horan for the sort of argy bargy fun that normally merits a finger wagging or a name taking. Minutes later Wexford's Mitch Jordan joined them. A promising, absorbing game fizzled and died.

Wexford kept going, but in the drizzle against a Tipp team relocating their confidence they always had too far to go and too little time to get there. Tipp return to the All-Ireland then.

Yesterday was Kilkenny and Galway's big day out. Or not. An air of fatalism hung over this one all week like a brooding storm trough. Galway received 8,000 tickets and declined to take any more, thanks. Travelling to Dublin to see the team beaten is another supposedly fun thing which Galway people have sworn off.

Kilkenny people made up some of the slack. Last chance to rub the chins and appraise the form before the coronation next month.

Afterwards, Galway's manager Noel Lane must have been speaking tongue in cheek when he said that he and his team were a little insulted not to have been given a chance. They got to Croke Park under cover of darkness and that suited them perfectly.

Kilkenny were thoroughly ambushed yesterday. Ambushed, disarmed and disbanded.

The teams started off like a couple of weasels involved in a blood feud and suddenly snared in a bag. John Power broke his stick before the throw in as the blows went in early and often. Fortunately, the rules which apply on Saturdays in Croke Park are suspended on Sunday when the referee must have the strong stomach of an emergency room orderly.

It was game of unfaltering ugliness, redeemed from ignominy only by the surprise result left in its wash, by Kevin Broderick's sublimely cheeky late point and by the engineered quality of Eugene Cloonan's play.

Cloonan had 2-9 of his team's total yesterday and those who bent an ear to his faultless modesty afterwards left with the impression that it was the luckiest 2-9 anyone scored in Croke Park for a long time.

"Our second goal? Ah it was a lucky ball that came in high I just got a boot to it. I suppose you take the chances; you need the breaks if you are going to beat Kilkenny. I always said we wouldn't give up like we did other years. The first (goal) was lucky, I hit the free a bit short, the sun caught (Kilkenny goalkeeper) James McGarry, it was a lucky goal. We tried as hard the other years, but we just got the breaks today."

For Kilkenny, the All-Ireland champions and the team who promised to rule the hurling decade to come, it was a sorry way to say goodbye. Their full-forward line, touted as perhaps the best ever, were limited to one point from play. Autopsy reports will suggest that they were starved of decent ball.

Kilkenny generally suffered in front of the goal, with Galway players throwing themselves again and again into their paths. In midfield and in the half-back line Kilkenny were filleted clean. Galway's young midfield pairing of Richie Murray and David Tierney aged about 10 years in the course of the match.

The win was achieved with just 14 men. After several extraordinary outbreaks of bad temper and bile a player was finally sent off on the half hour. Given what had gone before and what came afterwards Greg Kennedy was perhaps a little unlucky but by then referee Pat O'Connor had gotten over the fear that daylight would fade his cards, so when DJ Carey slipped with a freshly-booked Kennedy in the vicinity the red card was snapped out pronto.

On Saturday at the time of the double sending off Tipp would have accepted the loss of Brian O'Meara once it came with the loss of Liam Dunne for Wexford. To see Mitch Jordan go as well minutes later was a bonus which altered the character of the game.

Kennedy's dismissal had a less dramatic effect on proceedings. Galway for one, are the fittest hurling team around. Making up the space wasn't going to be a problem. Galway brought on Brian Higgins who hurled very well. Kilkenny, for all their wiles, didn't appear to know how to use the extra man.

"It maybe worked to our benefit," said Galway trainer Mike McNamara. "They were lost with the extra man. They tried using the spare man in a couple of places, sort of 'if that doesn't work try this'. And we had our defence packed, it was pure naked fear!

"Today was the challenge nobody relished, but any team would prefer Kilkenny in a semi-final rather than a final. We were able to remain more low key. Incredible pressure will come on in the final."

Too true. Tipp and Galway have never held each other in fond regard. Next month's is a final both teams reckon they can win. The race to claim the mantle of underdogs begins today.