All-Ireland SHC quarter-finals/ Kilkenny 1-11; Clare 0-9: Not a thing of beauty but a grimly fascinating thing nevertheless. Clare and Kilkenny continued their death dance in Thurles on Saturday evening and when their embrace was broken it was Kilkenny who got to walk on.

Well, walk might not describe the manner of their progress this week. Clare tenderised them and bruised them and had they a couple of scoring forwards they might have beaten them.

How many times though have we written that about Clare over the years? Having left without the scalp last week Clare travelled in hope on Saturday. Some of the things they had hoped for just didn't work out, however. Brian Lohan's hamstring was obedient under a stringent set of sprints on Thursday night. In Semple Stadium, though, it began nagging early and soon the great full back was sitting on the Clare bench again roaring imprecations.

That meant pulling Frank Lohan away from shore leave in the forwards, an alteration which robbed Clare of a little heft but didn't provide any easy pickings for the Kilkenny forwards.

Of most interest perhaps was the tactical game. Clare had set out the stall last week and were hard pressed to alter much in the interim. There are only so many tactical ideas which might work and this was an occasion when Clare were forced to stick with a good one but a used one.

Kilkenny, prepared this week, merely replicated the Clare tactic but got more out of themselves this time. Michael Kavanagh returned to the stage playing the role of "Alan Markham" for Kilkenny.

Afterwards Brian Cody was to comment Kavanagh's game hasn't "flowed" so far this year, yet it was clear the manager was well pleased with Kavanagh's reading of the match and his use of the ball. The Kilkenny defence did well, stingily rationing the chances for Clare and creating a little themselves.

In particular Tommy Walsh, following Andrew Quinn upfield, hurled a heap of ball in the first half and put Clare under massive pressure. Still, however, lots of ball dropped from the sky, shellacking the forwards instead of giving them something to chase.

Kilkenny's pressure never translated into a convincing margin and Cody will be disappointed at the slew of wides his forwards ran up on a day when Henry Shefflin looked out of sorts. James Cha Fitzpatrick, the latest bright thing off the St Kieran's production line, was introduced at corner forward but four wides was a disappointing take for a player of such potential.

He'll have better days but Martin Comerford, apart from two snap points at a key period in the second half, might not. At least not amid the current tactical and positional uncertainties. He looks most comfortable as a target man but on Saturday evening he seemed not to know whether he was supposed to shadow Markham or canter off into the full-forward position.

The result was a lot of traffic and very little flow. Kilkenny will have been grateful Eddie Brennan, despite compiling a reel of some of the game's worst misses, at least got back in the habit of scoring key goals.

On Saturday Brennan's goal came after just 11 minutes, a ground pull by Comerford skeetering diagonally across the goalmouth and into his path. That put Kilkenny five points clear with Clare yet to score and served to underline the difference in character between the original game and this.

Yet the goal also marks the essential oddness of this Kilkenny performance. Brennan should have had another goal in his pocket by then. John Hoyne might have had one a little later and Shefflin fumbled a pass on the quarter-hour to deny himself another fine chance. That set the scene for a decline.

After 18 minutes Brennan contributed the only other Kilkenny point before half-time and after the break it took till the 62nd minute and Martin Comerford's first score for Kilkenny to do some damage from play - 44 minutes without a score from play. They'll think about that this week and about how Clare harried them out of their stride all day.

The consolation was that when they needed the scores they came. Just past the midway of the second half Henry Shefflin had shipped what seems to have been a dirty blow and Tony Griffin had scored a point and it looked as if the momentum was swaying to Clare. Yet Comerford popped up with two scores in two minutes and effectively sealed the game, giving Kilkenny a six-point lead.

By then Clare had played every card. Innumerable switches in the defence, the marking tasks and the sweeping task included, reshuffles and refreshenings of the forwards, four subs, Big Ollie Baker warming up - the lot. It was game up.

Four points seemed about right for a margin, but when DJ Carey popped a sublime score from the right sideline 70 yards out to finish the game who could argue?

Kilkenny's lingering interest in this year's championship could, regrettably, be a sour one. Thirteen minutes before the end of play Henry Shefflin left the pitch with an eye injury. Brian Cody, relieved but simmering, told media after the game the player had been taken to hospital but initial prognosis was that the eye injury he had suffered would leave no permanent damage. Shefflin, obviously angered, went to the sideline at full time to remonstrate with his alleged assailant.

He had surgery on Saturday night in Ardkeen hospital and must be doubtful for Sunday's semi-final against Waterford.

Those who saw the initial incident say Shefflin received the butt of a hurley through his visor. Were perhaps the finest hurler of his generation to be without the use of an eye this morning it would be the result of official ambivalence on the issue of players striking other players with the hurley, an ambivalence which goes back to the start of this championship season and the Limeri'ck versus Cork game.

What the longer term holds for Clare remains to be seen. Anthony Daly's first year in charge has been a success. He has arrested the perceived decline and shown himself to be smart tactically and capable of transferring his own passion to the players on the field.

Whether he will yet be hindered by his county board's lack of foresight since 1995 in harvesting young players is moot.

Clare people seemed to accept Saturday was the end of the road for some heroes and that fresh replacements were hard to find.

Kilkenny proceed. Next Sunday versus Waterford. Mere mention of it sets the heart racing.

KILKENNY: J McGarry; T Walsh, N Hickey, J Ryall; M Kavanagh, P Barry, JJ Delaney; D Lyng, K Coogan; E Brennan (1-2), J Hoyne (0-1), DJ Carey (0-3, 1f, 1 65); M Comerford (0-2), H Shefflin (0-3 frees), J Fitzpatrick. Subs: J Maher for Shefflin (57 mins), S Dowling for Coogan (66 mins).

CLARE: D Fitzgerald; B Quinn, B Lohan, G O'Grady; D Hoey, S McMahon (0-2 frees), A Markham; D McMahon, C Lynch; J Reddan, G Quinn, F Lohan; N Gilligan (0-3 frees), T Griffin (0-1), A Quinn. Subs: C Plunkett for B Lohan (8 mins), J O'Connor (0-2) for A Quinn (21 mins), D Forde (0-1) for Hoey (28 mins), B Murphy for Reddan (h-t), O Baker for Markham (67 mins).

Referee: P Horan (Offaly).