Wrap-up
Canning cuts a sideline over but it’ll hardly even be a footnote to this one. It’s all over, as patchy a game of hurling as I’ve seen in a long time.
A tally of 1-12 is Galway’s lowest championship tally since they scored 1-10, also against Kilkenny, in 2004. Unlike back then, at least this time they’ll get another chance to atone for it.
Kilkenny have now scored 5-37 in their two championship games this summer without even getting close to their best. They’re straight into an All-Ireland semi-final now, so it’s a month of a rest before they stoke it up for the remainder of their five-in-a-row bid. There will be tougher tests to come, but you’d expect them to raise their game. In fact, you’d think they’d relish a bit of a challenge, which surely someone like Cork or Tipperary will be able to provide.
Anyway, over and out from JOE’s GAA trackers this afternoon.
Shefflin points again. 1-7 for him today. And he’s been quiet, which just shows how easy this has been. If Kilkenny had needed the scores, Shefflin might have scored 4-22 on his own.
They’re the Cats, and they’re playing with a mouse. Richie Hogan and Eoin Larkin combine and Larkin half-thinks about a goal before taking his point.
And finally they get to the magical 10-point barrier. Joe Canning with his first score of the game. We’ve three minutes plus injury time left, and I’m wishing my life away.
This one’s been over for the last ten minutes or so. Galway struggling to get their points tally into double figures but Eoin Lynch puts them within one of the milestone.
Kilkenny have the time and space to pick each other out in the forward line. It ends up on the stick of Richie Power and he takes a simple score when a goal may have been on.
Kevin Hynes, who must have been thrown into the Galway side when we were taking a well-earned nap a few moments ago, fires one over. Damien Hayes with a quick pick-up and strike from 45 metres adds another. They’re the exception rather than the rule, though. Galway have hit 13 wides today, I’m told.
Richie Power with another one, his second of the game. They’re ten points up with 15 minutes left against the National Hurling League champions and one of the few sides thought to be within touching distance of derailing the five-in-a-row bid. Yet I’m tempted to say that Kilkenny have been poor today.
I’m spoilt.
Shefflin to TJ Reid and it’s another point. One-way stripey traffic at this stage.
Galway get the ball into the half-forward line and Eoin Lynch has a go, which goes closer to the corner flag than the posts. If there’s a positive for Galway about that one, it’s that they managed to get across the half-way line.
When I said Brian Hogan a minute ago I meant Richie Hogan. I only noticed that because the first ball Hogan got he shows outstanding skill to fire his first point. “It’s like an egg-and-spoon race,” says Ger Canning. Only with a hurl and sliotar.
Kilkenny have clearly decided that they’ve had enough of this one as a contest. Aidan Fogarty adds another to open up an eight-point lead.
Maybe Brian Cody watches a bit of American Football on winter Sunday nights. He hooks Eddie Brennan and introduces Richie Hogan into the Kilkenny forward line.
TJ Reid ends a spell of crap hurling by snaffling Colm Callanan’s wayward puck-out and firing it back over the bar. John Tennyson catches the next puck-out, feeds it to Shefflin and he raises a white flag. Six in it now.
Shefflin with another wide. That’s 11 for Kilkenny so far today. They were very rusty for long spells against Dublin too, and you sense that if Galway had a bit of drive and belief they could win this.
Eddie Brennan tries to stoke up a bit of a squabble by grabbing the face-mask of Ollie Canning. He gets booked but it looked very dangerous and could easily have been red. In American Football, face-mask offences are one of the most serious a player can perpetrate.
We have changes. Cyril Donnellan is on for Galway with Aonghus Callanan off, and Aidan Fogarty is on for Kilkenny in place of the anonymous Martin Comerford.
Actually, he’s not anonymous. He has a name. It’s Martin Comerford. Ineffectual. That’s probably a better word.
This is dire stuff, and what makes it even worse is the fact that so much was expected. Donal O’Grady in the commentary box is taling about the swirling breeze but I don’t buy it. Strangely for a first ever Leinster final between these two sides, it’s seriously lacking in intensity.
And the malaise is catching. Shefflin strikes one wide, and not just wide. Well wide.
Tommy Walsh doesn’t even look really up for it. He’s still getting on the ball more than anyone else but his clearances have been more casual than usual. Both goalkeepers, PJ Ryan and Colm Callanan, look uncertain against dropping balls within a minute. I blame the Jabulani.
Free. Shefflin. Point.
Free. Farragher. Point.
We’re back on, Tommy the leprechaun wins a free straight from the throw-in and Shefflin fires it over.
Blow it up, ref.
And he does.
“Interesting but far from spectacular,” is Ger Canning’s assessment. I’m not even sure it’s been that interesting.
Galway have been trying to play a possession or passing game but to my mind it hasn’t worked. It’s designed to get accurate ball into Damien Hayes at full forward. But David Collins has just delivered a 100-yard dropping ball on top of Hayes and Noel Hickey, and unsurprisingly Kilkenny come out with it. Maybe Hayes is frustrated, because he’s just been booked for a foul on Tommy Walsh.
Another Farragher free brings Galway within three again. The Tribesmen have scored two points from play and a soft Damien Hayes goal. Joe Canning has been wrapped up well. And still they’re only three behind. Strange.
Horrible hurling. How many times do you see Richie Power, in plenty of space 50 yards out, barely reach the 21-yard line?
A lot of tipping and tapping in the Galway forward line comes to nothing, Kilkenny clear it up the field where Richie Power plucks it out of the air and whacks it straight over the bar. That’s the way to do it.
Farragher points another free to cut the gap to three. Still waiting for this one to catch fire. Galway boss John McIntyre makes a change – Eoin Lynch in, Adrian Cullinane out.
A point from play by Henry Shefflin, with an assist from Galway goalkeeper Colm Callanan, takes his personal tally to 1-3 already. And he hasn’t even played overly well.
That looked just like Joe Canning. He bursts onto it and with barely a turn barrels it over the bar. It wasn’t Canning, though, it was Iarla Tannian, and it was a Galway point.
Goal Galway!
A soft, soft goal for Kilkenny to concede. Noel Hickey and PJ Ryan hesitate fatally and Damien Hayes is able to flick it to the net. A big boost to Galway, particularly as big guns like Hayes and Joe Canning had failed to fire up to this.
Eighteen minutes in, Joe Canning has his first sight of the posts and he’s off target. Poor stuff from the big man, by his lofty standards.
Ger Farragher converts a free but I know which midfielder I’d like to have in my team. Michael Rice gets on it again with Farragher unseen, and the Kilkenny man hits his second score of the game.
That was like watching hurling in slow motion. Michael Rice gets forward and his laboured sidestep is enough to send Ger Farragher about 14 yards away. Rice fires it over and there’s six in it.
Goal Kilkenny!
And with that there’s distance between the sides. TJ Reid fires over from the Hogan Stand sideline and seconds later Henry Shefflin finds the net from a tight angle. Colm Callanan is a fine keeper but he hadn’t a hope with that one.
Only Aidan Harte and Damien Hayes will know how that didn’t find the net. PJ Ryan fails to clutch a dropping ball and both Galway forwards have a slash at it, but the sliotar trickles the wrong side of the post.
Or the right side if you’re from Kilkenny.
Surely a booking. Richie Power gets on the ball and Shane Kavanagh hauls him to the floor. He gets the booking but it was possibly worth it – Power would have had his eye for goal. Shefflin flicks the free over the bar.
And another wide, this time from TJ Reid. Eight minutes gone and we’ve had a point, but that’ll change now as Eddie Brennan tumbles under a David Collins challenge. Henry Shefflin it is, and Henry points.
Unsatisfactory stuff. Flicks and scuffs and no-one really getting control of possession. It drops between Eoin Larkin and Galway goalkeeper Colm Callanan, Larkin gets a stick to it but it drops wide.
And just to prove this leprechaun isn’t all about magic, Tommy Walsh breaks his hurley across the shins of Andy Smith and gets a yellow for his troubles. Ger Farragher fails to connect with the free and it trails wide.
Apart from that Tommy-Iarla skirmish, this one’s been a bit of a slow burner so far. Eddie Brennan has scuffed a sideline cut, Henry Shefflin has hit wide from 25 metres and Andy Smith has been off target for Galway. Still just the one in it.
Tommy Walsh, who Ger Loughnane described in the preliminaries as “like a leprechaun coming out from under a mushroom”, comes out from under a mushroom with the sliotar. Iarla Tannian fouls him, Tommy and Iarla give each other a few flakes. The blood is up already. I mean me, and I’m on my own in the office.
First chance of the game and Aidan Harte fires it over from a tight angle. Good start, but you sense they’ll need to take every one of those to win this one.
Or if you don’t sense that, I do.
And we’re away!
We’ve had the parade and everyone is standing very stoically, hands behind their backs, for the national anthem. I don’t have my hands behind my back, for reasons I hope are obvious.
RTE has highlighted the helmet of Kilkenny goalkeeper PJ Ryan, which has a bar missing. “He definitely has tampered with it,” says Ger Canning’s sidekick and former Cork manager Donal O’Grady. “Whether it’s kosher with the GAA and whether he is insured I don’t know.”
1552:
Confirmation of the Galway team, with David Collins proving his fitness to take his place with John Lee losing out. Adrian Cullinane is in for the suspended David Burke at midfield.
Galway: Colm Callanan, Damien Joyce, Shane Kavanagh, Ollie Canning, Donal Barry, Tony Og Regan, David Collins, Ger Farragher, Adrian Cullinane, Aonghus Callinan, Aidan Harte, Andy Smith, Damien Hayes, Joe Canning, Iarla Tannian.
Here’s a reminder of the Kilkenny team. Waiting confirmation on Galway’s, but will bring it to you soon.
Kilkenny: P.J. Ryan, John Dalton, Noel Hickey, Jackie Tyrell, Tommy Walsh, Brian Hogan, J.J. Delaney, Michael Rice, Michael Fennelly, T.J. Reid, Eddie Brennan, Eoin Larkin, Martin Comerford, Richard Power, Henry Shefflin
