Eoin Cody started the rout last Saturday for a Kilkenny side clearly hell-bent on delivering a statement victory at Croke Park.
Cody’s third minute goal set the Cats on their way to a 16-point win over Dublin in the Leinster final. In the end, the Dubs were lucky to escape with that.
The performance secured a fifth consecutive Leinster title for Kilkenny and confirms their standing as the top team in the province. But afterwards, the noises coming from Kilkenny indicated the group has found their motivating angle for the rest of the summer.
“That’s always the narrative [Leinster is weaker than Munster] but five in a row in Leinster, it’s only happened a few times,” said Cody.
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“I don’t think we get enough credit for the consistency in this group of players.
“We’ve come up against a great Limerick team the last couple of years, but we’ll always back ourselves and we don’t need anybody from the outside telling us what we’re good at and what we’re not good at.”
Cody’s sentiments echoed those put forward by team captain Paddy Deegan at Croke Park on Saturday.
“There’s a massive drive there, our ambition is an All-Ireland,” said Deegan. “We know we are a very good team, we know what we are about.
“I don’t think we were given the respect there the last few weeks, even coming to this match as well I don’t think we were given the respect we deserve. That probably adds a bit of a chip to the shoulder.”
Just what the rest of the hurling world needs, Kilkenny feeling slighted. Derek Lyng’s men can warm to that narrative now over the next four weeks as they prepare for an All-Ireland semi-final.
Saturday’s display was certainly their best of the season after they struggled for consistency during the group stages, which included a draw with Carlow and a late win over Dublin thanks to a Cody 70th-minute goal. But if they are hitting form now, Kilkenny’s timing couldn’t be much better.
“You saw what Dublin did to us a few weeks ago,” continued Cody. “They had their system and we probably weren’t prepared for it then and playing against it ourselves we weren’t happy with how it went.
“We really got on top of it and studied it [before the Leinster final]. We knew what they were going to do, we knew what we wanted to do and we counter-attacked that especially in the forwards.
“It comes from their puckouts where they start their running game. It was up to us forwards to stop them doing that.
“We are where we want to be now, in an All-Ireland semi-final, and we’ll have a few weeks of good-weather training. We know we have that privilege so we’re going to give it everything over the next three or four weeks.”
