By John Harrington

Every now and then a statistic comes along that casts Kilkenny’s recent hurling dominance into stark relief.

Their relatively long-serving corner-back, Paul Murphy, came out with one earlier this week when he remarked that he’d only ever experienced a losing dressing-room on All-Ireland Final day on one occasion out of seven.

That, of course, came after last year’s heavy Final defeat to Tipperary, an ordeal that clearly took him some time to fully process.

“When it happens, it's such a strange feeling when it happens and it's such an anti-climax really,” says Murphy.

“There's nothing for second place, there's nothing for the loser. It's such an anti-climax and it's such a waste of a year really, is what it is. It is hard to get your head around and as you go on over the winter it just comes back to you every so often.

“You're at different events and you're reminded of it yourself just working day to day. It does stick with you and, like I said, it sticks with you more than the winning ones. It would affect you more than winning one.”

If ever a statement summed up the mentality of Kilkenny hurling teams it’s that any year you don’t win the All-Ireland is a waste of a year.

Under Brian Cody they’ve become so hard-wired to win the Liam MacCarthy Cup, that any year in which they don’t is deemed as a total failure.

“I suppose James McGarry was the person who said it a few years ago,” says Murphy.

“It was drilled into us for the last while – it is, in our minds, a waste of a year. I don't know what way other teams picture it, everybody to their own, that's the way we picture it. It is a waste of a year.

“When you're putting yourself in contention for these things, it's just the way you have to see it because you want to be winning them and when you're training...like we're training the last 10 days now, up until September, to lose the one match that you want to win, that's effectively a waste of a year because that's what you're training for – to win the All-Ireland.

“You're not training to win the Walsh Cup or these things, you want to win them and you want to build towards it but the All-Ireland is what you want to win. So not winning it is just scrapped.”

So how has losing an All-Ireland Final for the very first time affected Murphy? You probably won’t be surprised to hear it’s lit a fire in him for the 2017 season ahead.

“I suppose I've been very lucky that I've been in winning dressing rooms the last few years but when you sample both dressing rooms it gives you a great picture of the greater scheme of things,” he says.

“The winning one is obviously great, you want to get back into it but the losing feeling, I don't think, compares to the winning one for spurring you on.

“The losing one, there's a serious fire there, you don't want to be in the losing dressing room, that's the thing. And that's nearly more scary than trying to get into the winning one.

“You want to be in the winning one but the fear of being in the losing one is nearly worse than being in the winning one. Certainly it is motivation.

“It's a new angle. It's my seventh All-Ireland but the first time I sampled it and I'm appreciative that it is but it is somewhere you don't want to be going back into.

“You do enjoy going back now because you're feeling you're getting the wheels in motion to try and get things right as you would feel it, get back and make a mark in both the League and the Championship. So yeah it definitely is.

“You have to learn from these things and bring them on with you. There's no point in experiencing a feeling like that and just leaving it there.

“You might as well bring it with you and it could be the difference between winning and losing a matches somewhere along the year.”

Murphy’s consistent excellence in the Kilkenny full-back line since 2011 has become such a feature of their play that it almost jarred the senses to see him under pressure to the extent he was against Tipperary last September.

Any full-back line is going to struggle against players like John ‘Bubbles’ O’Dwyer, Seamus Callanan, and John McGrath if that trio get the quality of ball they did in the All-Ireland Final, but it was still a bad day at the office for Murphy, Joey Holden, and Shane Prendergast.

Their direct opponents scored a total of 2-21, 2-15 of which was from play, so not surprisingly much of the post-match analysis dwelled on the decimation of the Kilkenny full-back line.

“Look, obviously the glaring thing was 2-21 and of course we have analysed it ourselves,” says Murphy.

“I suppose if I was 19 or 20 and I was in that position, I may have take it a lot harder from the point of view of people outside talking.

“I took it hard on myself as my own performance and the full-back line as a unit, but, in terms of the outside talk, people are entitled to talk and do analysis on it and have their opinions and you have to respect that.

“I didn't take it on board myself in terms of I didn't take it hard that 'this person talking is right or that person', I just didn't pay any attention to it. I broke it down myself, we talked about it ourselves.

“That's what I take on board from it. Look, I was in the best position that year to see what happened. I don't need anyone else to tell me what happened that day.”

The occasional hosing is part of the life-cycle of every corner-back no matter how good he is.

When you’re the last line of defence you’re only one slip or mistimed tackle away from disaster, and disaster always comes eventually.

You need to have a certain sort of mentality to survive in the position, because you can’t afford to let those nightmare moments to drain your self-confidence or play on your mind from one game to the next.

That’s why Murphy is one of the best in the business – he’s able to close the door behind him move on whenever he does have one of those very infrequent bad days at the office.

“Yeah I suppose it's just something (you develop) through having different experiences, I've had my days, that wasn't the only day in Croke Park that I've been on the end of a beating.

“The 2012 Leinster final against Galway, the League final against Dublin was one of my first matches playing senior for Kilkenny in Croke Park. I've had these experiences and one thing I've learned is you can just park them.

“It can be a long career if you're bringing them on with you constantly. You bring on the things that you need to bring on with you and the pain of it and lessons learned but you don't knock your confidence.

“I've had too many good years to be saying that just because of one bad day that you go, 'That's it, I'm finished'. It doesn't work like that and you have to approach it that way as well.”

2016 was a waste of a year, like the rest of the Kilkenny panel Murphy is determined to be more productive in 2017.

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