Waterford will have to throw off the shackles to threaten Kilkenny

On any known form it is very hard to see how Waterford are going to beat Kilkenny.

This isn't how I thought the championship would pan out back in May when the idea was around that Kilkenny might be vulnerable because of their increasingly shallow panel strength and the injuries to Ger Aylward and James Maher.

The championship has told a different tale, though.

Waterford haven't progressed as I thought they might after signs in the league final replay and the Munster semi-final against Clare that they were developing more attack-oriented tactics.

But the Munster final against Tipperary turned into a horror show and the level of performance against Wexford didn't advance things much, either. If you're going to beat Kilkenny you'll need 25 or 26 points, which is a big demand to place on Waterford's players and their system.

Against Wexford, they got just 21 points so bettering that on Sunday is going to take considerable improvement and realistically it can’t be done without goals. Waterford haven’t scored a goal since the fourth minute of the Munster semi-final. That’s virtually three games.

It’s probably no coincidence that Clare, pioneers of playing defensively in the past few years, have also failed to score enough goals against counties who are contenders. That’s important because scoring averages are way up in the modern game and it’s incredibly hard to get there on points alone.

Probably because of the Munster final they became more cautious and even more defensive against Wexford and it’s going to be hard in the space of two weeks to come up with a more free-flowing game.

Last year they set up to get close to Kilkenny without ever looking likely to beat them. The abiding image of that semi-final was Maurice Shanahan on his own up front battling under high balls with Joey Holden and Shane Prendergast with Eoin Murphy in the goal almost playing sweeper. At this stage they have to be more ambitious than to aim for another narrow defeat.

My expectations of Waterford this year was that their game would evolve because younger players like Shane Bennett and Patrick Curran had been playing well with their colleges and could ignite a more attack-conscious game plan.

Looking at it now the win over Clare was a high point and unfortunately that form line doesn’t carry much weight at this stage.

Bennett and Curran haven’t yet reached the heights I thought they might and the question now is, have Waterford got the players to go orthodox on Kilkenny?

In my view they have to find out because even though one thing we know is that you can’t fall behind against Kilkenny and end up chasing a match with much prospect of success, neither can you beat them by simply defending for 70 minutes.

It’s been argued as an alibi for Waterford that they haven’t converted enough of the chances they’ve created but it’s arguable whether shooting from 70 or 80 metres actually constitutes a chance. It’s more something that’s forced on them by a lack of forward options and a pattern of play that sees them carrying the ball and shooting from distance to a greater extent than other teams.

In our day if the half backs and midfielders were doing that on a regular basis there’d have been war. There’s nothing more demoralising for a corner forward than to have the ball flying over his head and wide.

Donie Nealon used to say, "take the easy scores" but Waterford are killing themselves with Kevin Moran, Jamie Barron and Austin Gleeson making lung-bursting runs at the end of which they are hitting pressurised shots, frequently off the hurley and from challenging positions.

The task facing Waterford in this semi-final is daunting. It’s only natural that their confidence would be affected by the Munster final – that defeat was so comprehensive that it won’t have been easy to wash out as a bad day at the office – and if they’re experiencing any doubts Kilkenny aren’t the ideal opposition.

The match of the year was the Leinster final. Galway put Kilkenny in a difficult situation and typically, they didn't panic came out in the second half and fought seriously hard to overturn the deficit. I think that performance was better than the second half of last year's All-Ireland final.

Richie Hogan came out with fire in his eyes and hungry to hurl and TJ Reid was also more on his game and when you put that together with the back-up of hard work from Michael Fennelly and Conor Fogarty in the middle and their superb half backs it's obvious to me that at the very least Kilkenny haven't gone backwards from last year.

It will be really important for Waterford to throw off the shackles and go out and compete rather than try just to keep the score down. Even if they have to be cautious for a while, at some stage you need to try to win and that means getting goals because we know that Kilkenny will get them and that they will also create pressure around the middle, which won’t make shooting from distance any easier.

My concern for Waterford is that regardless of the system if a team has been disappointing over a couple of games in July, I’m not sure they can flick a switch in August and suddenly find form. And there’s been no sign of Kilkenny losing theirs.