Opinion: No easy fix as Kilkenny heads into the hurling unknown

With the senior, under-20 and minor teams now out of championship action, Kilkenny faces a quiet few months on the intercounty hurling scene. | SPORTSFILE

placeholder image — With the senior, under-20 and minor teams now out of championship action, Kilkenny faces a quiet few months on the intercounty hurling scene. | SPORTSFILE

At a crossroads: What’s next for the Cats as lack of underage success comes back to bite?

Under normal circumstances, Kilkennny hurling followers would be preparing for a trip to Croke Park for this Saturday evening’s Leinster Final but not only are the Cats missing out this weekend, they are also looking on afar for the rest of the championship.

You have to go all the way back to the 2019 Leinster Final between Wexford and Galway for the last time KIlkenny were absent in the battle to win the Bob O’Keeffe Cup but crucially Brian Cody’s team still had enough about them to make the All-Ireland Final the following August.

That’s what makes the last week so different and after the initial shock went away, the reality has hit that Kilkenny are no longer part of the race for the Liam MacCarthy Cup after exiting the Leinster round-robin for the first time since it’s inception back in 2018.

It was a seismic conclusion to a very difficult Leinster campaign but after falling to heavy defeats at the hands of Dublin and Galway and drawing with an improving Offaly team, a win over a poor Wexford side and a relegated Kildare was never going to be enough and in truth it was a very disappointing showing throughout the five game series.

In the end a debated 65 and an Eoghan Cahill last puck of the game to help Offaly draw with Kilkenny in round 3 in Tullamore was the main reason for the early elimination to Derek Lyng’s side and with Jordan Molloy also suffering an ACL injury on that same afternoon, it was an early indication that creaks were beginning to appear in the Noresiders ranks.

Injuries played a big part in Kilkenny’s year with Adrian Mullen a particular loss as he only made second half appearances in the last two Leinster meetings with Kildare and Dublin and while the loss of key men was one thing, it also showed the lack of depth in the current Kilkenny panel and that was a running theme throughout the shortened summer.

The lack of star players coming through the Kilkenny underage ranks over the last decade or so is probably one of the main reasons that Kilkenny sit in their current situation but the stats behind it make for even more grim reading.

Since Kilkenny won their last All-Ireland Senior title in 2015, the county has brought home a grand total of one All-Ireland crown at minor, under 20/21 and senior in the intervening 11 years and even that under-20 success under Derek Lyng’s tutelage against Limerick in 2022 comes with a bit of an asterisk with senior player Cathal O’Neill playing no part in any of the games for the Treaty County.

A closer look at the two squads on that afternoon will reveal even more as along with O’Neill, Colin Coughlan, Aidan O’Connor, Adam English and Shane O’Brien have all played a starring role for the Limerick senior squad in the four years that have passed but Kilkenny’s success rate is much more hit and miss.

From that All-Ireland starting team, Aidan Tallis, Padraic Moylan, Timmy Clifford, Killian Doyle, Gearoid Dunne and Billy Drennan were the main men to make the step up but Doyle and Clifford were the only ones to play any part in the recent Leinster SHC meeting with Dublin so it’s fair to say they probably haven’t got enough out of that underage crop.

It’s not as if Derek Lyng didn’t give them a chance either with Niall Rowe, Denis Walsh, Ian Byrne, Joe Fitzpatrick, Paddy Langton, Ian Byrne and Peter McDonald also getting an opportunity but for one reason or another, things haven’t quite worked out.

People will talk about the 11 senior All-Ireland titles won from the beginning of the millennium to the last win in 2015 but possibly more relevant and in the same timeframe, there was also five All-Ireland minor titles and four under-20/21 crowns coming back to Noreside.

That alone is in stark contrast to Kilkenny’s current predicament and when all is said and done, it’s probably the main reason, success at senior level has dried up with less quality players coming through the system.

Winning at underage doesn’t absolutely guarentee a county will also win at the top level but it’s still the best barometer and while there have been small shoots with All-Ireland Final appearances at minor and under 20 over the last two years, there is still a lot of work to be done from a Kilkenny point of view.