‘The better team won’ – Canning

Joe Canning has accepted the fact that “the better team” won this year’s All-Ireland SHC final, and he feels it was Kilkenny’s “experience” that saw them triumph on the second day.

After their absorbing clash on the second Sunday in September the Leinster rivals squared up to each other again but this time around the Cats made no mistake, running out comfortable 11-point winners as Henry Shefflin wrote himself into the history books winning his ninth Celtic Cross.

“Everything is settling in now and you’re kind of depressed thinking about the last month and a half,” Canning is quoted as saying in the Irish Examiner.

“The better team won and that’s the honest truth.

“Kilkenny wanted it that small bit more. Their experience, I suppose, came to the fore the second day. They were the better team on the day and we’ve no qualms with that.

The Portumna star went on: “To win Leinster and to get to an All-Ireland final was a good year but only one match counts when you get that far and we’d be disappointed that we didn’t finish off the year.

“If you said at the start of the year you would have probably taken this considering we didn’t get past the quarter-finals for the seven previous years before that.

“There was a lot more goodwill from the Galway public this year. Even after we lost, there was a great crowd there in Salthill and that was nice to see.

“Earlier on this year, people were questioning whether we’d go far or not but winning the Leinster championship gave a good bit back to the supporters and got them on our side again.

“It was hard for them to be following over the last couple of years when we weren’t performing and weren’t at the right end of results.”