GAA:THIS WAS a really strange match. It started in relatively normal fashion with an early Kilkenny goal but by the finish you had a full set of Waterford defenders camped at one end hitting long balls down to a full set of Kilkenny defenders camped at the other end.

End-to-end stuff but not in a good way. The shape had completely gone out of the game by then, so much so that Kilkenny were playing with Richie Hogan back sweeping around his half-back line. That’s very unlike a Brian Cody team.

Kilkenny don’t often change formation, certainly not to one as odd as this.

I don’t think they set out to do it but it just seemed to be that kind of game and they went with it. For the last 10 minutes, Eddie Brennan was playing on his own against five or six Waterford lads inside their 65. That’s not something you’d ever be used to seeing from Kilkenny.

Waterford did very well to come back into the game after Richie Hogan’s early goal because that’s usually the point where Kilkenny stretch clear of teams. The vital moment came with his second goal and the save by David Herity from John Mullane just before it.

That was the obvious turning point in the game. Waterford had worked really hard to get back into it, they hadn’t given up and if Mullane had got a second goal there the game would have been in the melting pot.

But Kilkenny went in six points up at half-time and Henry Shefflin got the first two after the break as well. There was never a point where I felt they were going to lose.

Waterford completely overdid the possession game and it was very much to blame for their downfall. Time after time, you saw a Waterford defender coming out with the ball and instead of letting it down the field, he passed it off to a team-mate a few yards away.

There’s nothing wrong with that now and again but it became so predictable that Kilkenny knew they just had to bide their time and stick to their men. They knew that they were eventually going to be able to force a turnover.

For a game that Kilkenny won fairly comfortably in the end, Waterford controlled a huge amount of possession. When they had Mullane in playing alongside Shane Walsh in a two-man full-forward line, they were able to do damage. Walsh had the beating of Noel Hickey in there in that period and Mullane was having a great game. But too often they slowed the ball down and didn’t feed it in.

You can overcomplicate hurling sometimes. Limerick did that on their way out of the championship and Waterford did it again yesterday. They have a terrible overreliance on passing the ball short and giving the opposition time to set themselves and keep the play in front of them.

Brick Walsh is one of their best players but he’s also one of the main culprits. You rarely see him hitting the ball long. I wouldn’t mind but very often they’re passing it off to players who are already covered and under huge pressure. If you’re going to be doing that, you’re much better off doing it 60 or 70 yards down the pitch than in the middle of the field.

The second Kilkenny goal just before half-time was crucial but I still think if Waterford had come out and gone a bit more direct in the second half they could have had a chance to get somewhere.

Mullane was absolutely outstanding. He was head-and-shoulders above the rest and easily the man of the match. But he was nearly carrying the fight on his own in the second half because Waterford got too bogged down in keeping possession. A more cavalier approach would have suited them far better.

There could have been something in this game for them because Kilkenny gave a very curious performance. They looked to have very low energy levels for some reason. They seemed to lose concentration at times and some of their striking was very poor. Not only had they a lot of wides but some of them were aimless wides, particularly near the finish. They took the wrong option more than you’d expect from them and in the end it was their big leaders who carried them through. When in doubt, Henry Shefflin’s points kept them ticking over.

A display like that from such an experienced team is hard to explain. I expected them to be a lot hungrier. Given how good they were in putting Dublin away, I thought they would come into this game with all guns blazing. But they looked to be lacking in fizz. Maybe the strange, shapeless nature of the game got to them. Certainly, this was nothing like the form they showed in the Leinster final.

They will be delighted to be in the final above all else. And if Tipperary beat Dublin next Sunday, Kilkenny will go into the game as underdogs. If you compare what Tipp did to Waterford with what Kilkenny did to them, Tipp come out so much the better. Even allowing for the fact that Waterford were set-up completely wrong against Tipp, Kilkenny still weren’t anywhere near as impressive.

In their pomp, you never saw them setting up as defensively as they were in the closing minutes yesterday. That wasn’t the Kilkenny of old. I think a good portion of their players will be looking at the All Ireland final as a last-stand job now. There’s a good chance we won’t see a few of them hurling in 2012 so this All-Ireland final will be as far ahead as they’re willing to look. That will make them very dangerous in the final but there’s no doubt they will need to show much more than they did yesterday if they’re to win it.