Kilkenny - 2-20 Clare - 0-19 Kilkenny hurling teams have been famous over the years for some tightly won All-Irelands, wrested from frustrated opponents on narrow margins.

This wasn't one of them.

The Leinster champions scored too easily and competed too aggressively for yesterday's Guinness All-Ireland hurling final ever to ignite. The county now has 27 titles, only one off Cork at the top of the roll of honour.

Between them, Henry Shefflin and DJ Carey amassed 2-13 - the same as Clare's combined total - and left their team-mates to come up with the seven-point winning margin.

Shefflin was outstanding from the start and capped his display with a delightful second-half goal that gilded the lily for Kilkenny.

There wasn't much more that could have gone wrong for Clare. Outplayed, outscored and outshone all over the field, they plugged away until the very end, fiercely resisted the inevitable and even threatened a second-half revival, but all to no avail.

It's not to diminish those efforts to say that the match as a contest was in difficulties from the third minute.

Pre-match theorising had dwelled more than a bit on Clare's tendency to start slowly.

Setting that against the rapacity of the Kilkenny attack, there was a danger of a bad start becoming virtually irrecoverable.

That, unfortunately for Clare, is exactly what happened.

Cyril Lyons' team started with the good news that Gerry Quinn had recovered sufficiently from a badly broken hand to take his place at left wing back and he played well in the circumstances. But that was the extent of the glad tidings.

Just over two minutes into the match, Henry Shefflin cut straight through the middle of Clare's defence and dropped in a ball invitingly for DJ Carey who had drifted across the square.

About the last thing Clare wanted was to concede a goal at that stage and about the last player they would have wanted to score it was Carey.

But there he was - gloved fist triumphantly aloft and running back to his corner - having struck a crushing early blow.

By the 15th minute, it was 1-5 to 0-2 and Clare's highly-rated defence had suffered the following indignities: Carey's goal was a nightmare start for Brian Quinn; Martin Comerford had won the first ball off Brian Lohan, survived some buffeting and scored a point; Seán McMahon was in eagle-eyed form from long-distance frees, but Shefflin had already taken him for two points as well as the assist for Carey's goal.

With their backs under pressure, Clare were unable to do much better further forward.

Colin Lynch - like McMahon and Lohan behind him - was unable to get into the game as Andy Comerford and Derek Lyng ran the show at centrefield.

In the circumstances, too much ball going into the Clare forwards was hasty and snatched, ballooned into the air and read with learned precision by the Kilkenny defence.

This was the tin hat for Clare.

What little ball got through to them was accompanied by ravening defenders. Philip Larkin played more ball yesterday than he had probably played cumulatively in the championship to date.

Never mind that some of it was poorly hit to start with or sometimes not brilliantly cleared, because Larkin was sharp as a blade.

The whole Kilkenny full-back line was in control.

Noel Hickey was in the thick of it and engineered a couple of fine clearances, turning defence into attack while Mick Kavanagh made sure that David Forde got no joy out of the various passes overhit in his direction.

Yet, there's no point in labouring on individual contributions because the overwhelming impression was of collective determination - Clare forwards were surrounded when they tried to kick out on solo runs and Kilkenny defenders in possession were never on their own with back-up always quickly at hand.

It was another unwelcome deviation from script that saw Ollie Baker take the field in the 20th minute - much earlier than has been considered ideal by Cyril Lyons and his selectors in previous matches.

There was no cure for it, however, as John Reddan was struggling terribly to stay in touch.

In the wins over Waterford and Galway, Clare had managed to keep their opponents in sight and claim a goal just before the break.

To an extent, the first half of this prescription was being followed with McMahon dispatching a 65 and two frees and Tony Griffin, Niall Gilligan and Colin Lynch taking good points when the chances presented themselves.

The trouble was that, unlike in the previous matches, Kilkenny hit back all the time, cancelling out whatever inroads Clare had made.

If there was one glimmer of opportunity for the goal that might have revived the contest, it came in injury-time at the end of the first half. Lynch picked out Gilligan and his quick shot flashed over rather than under the bar.

The outlook for Clare was bleak at half-time as they trailed 0-8 to 1-11. They hadn't eroded enough of the deficit and Kilkenny didn't look remotely likely to get an attack of nerves in the second half.

Unless something out of the ordinary happened, the match was over.

Clare did reduce the deficit by three, but the effect was that of a painstakingly constructed tower of building blocks that Kilkenny swept aside.

The only thing out of the ordinary that happened was some of Kilkenny's scoring.

In the 52nd minute, Carey twisted and turned Baker on the right wing, darted forward leaving his opponent tumbled in a despairing heap and almost in slow motion tapped the ball once on the stick before lazily floating it over the bar to restore the six-point margin.

Then, Brian Cody was able to unveil his replacements and both Brian McEvoy and Charlie Carter got on the board.Shefflin's goal came in the 64th minute. It was a tribute to Martin Comerford, the rookie full forward who caused Brian Lohan no end of problems.

Comerford blocked his clearance, collected possession and placed an inviting ball in front of the goal.

Either Shefflin got the most delicate of touches to steer it just beyond Fitzgerald into the Canal goal or else Gerry Quinn, who was in front of the Kilkenny man, was responsible.

Shefflin thinks it was himself, but pointed out that two years ago a goal he thought he'd scored in the final against Offaly later turned out to be DJ's. Presumably, on this occasion, the other player won't mind him having it.

The match ran down with Clare replacements gamely clocking late scores to keep the score respectable - which, on the day, seven points was.

KILKENNY: 1 J McGarry; 2 M Kavanagh, 3 N Hickey, 4 P Larkin; 5 R Mullally, 6 P Barry, 7 JJ Delaney; 8 A Comerford (capt.), 9 D Lyng; 10 J Hoyne, 11 H Shefflin, 12 J Coogan; 13 E Brennan, 14 M Comerford, 15 DJ Carey. Subs: 19 B McEvoy for Hoyne (51 mins); 18 C Carter for Coogan (54); 20 J Power for Brennan (72). Booked: P Barry (43 mins).

CLARE: 1 Fitzgerald; 2 B Quinn, 3 B Lohan (capt.), 4 F Lohan; 5 D Hoey, 6 S McMahon, 7 G Quinn; 8 J Reddan, 9 C Lynch; 10 J O'Connor, 11 T Griffin, 12 A Markham; 13 T Carmody, 14. N Gilligan, 15 D Forde. Subs: 21 O Baker for Reddan (20 mins); 22 G Considine for Forde (56); 23 A Quinn for Markham (61); C Plunkett for Baker (69). Booked: T Griffin (45 mins), B Quinn (51).