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Brian Cody: "It was very finely balanced"

Kilkenny manager Brian Cody shakes hands with Wexford manager Davy Fitzgerald following the Leinster GAA Hurling Senior Championship Final at Croke Park.

Kilkenny manager Brian Cody shakes hands with Wexford manager Davy Fitzgerald following the Leinster GAA Hurling Senior Championship Final at Croke Park.

By Michael Devlin

There was little in the way of consternation from Kilkenny manager Brian Cody following yesterday’s Leinster final defeat to Wexford.

In the end, only a goal separated two teams who were otherwise neck-in-neck all the way through the game, and while Kilkenny’s 12 wides to Wexford’s three might illustrate to an extent where the game was won and lost, Mark Fanning’s penalty was ultimately the defining moment according to Cody.

“I can’t say it got away from us. Obviously the game that is was, it was just very finely balanced all through, and the goal was going to be a huge score. They got a goal, and that obviously had a huge influence on it.

“There was a couple of chances for points that maybe we could have gotten a point but it was a huge score today really. It was a one score game at the end of the day. The players worked very, very hard, played with great determination right through, and played very, very well. They played some great hurling.

“I thought the players fought it out to the bitter end. They never stopped giving it everything. They kept going and kept going. But, overall, the game could have gone either way. Obviously, it went their way, and that’s it.

“It’s the Leinster Final and we’d love to win the Leinster Final obviously, but we leave today in the quarter final of the championship and that’s the most important thing really.”

By Cody’s own admission, his team had performed admirably, and Kilkenny’s errors were not major, but the longest-serving inter-county manager in the game still knows that improvement is always there to be chased after.  

“Well every day you go out you are trying to look for more. The players themselves, they look for more from themselves and that’s the nature of sport. It’s the nature of teams. When you lose, you go the next day and look to train to try to get to another level to try and get that win, but it’s a very competitive championship. The next day out is going to be at least as difficult, if not more difficult.

Next up for the Cats is either Cork or Joe McDonagh Cup runners-up Westmeath in a fortnight. Those teams play this weekend in a preliminary quarter-final, and Cody reiterated he isn’t taken it for granted that it’ll be the Munster side he’ll be preparing for.

“We are not dismissing anyone. We are in the quarter final, and they play next weekend, so then take it on from there. Whenever we meet, we meet. I suppose it is more about how we play ourselves then who we are playing against.”