ALL IRELAND HURLING SEMI-FINAL: Seán Moran profiles a player whose confidence is sky-high ahead of a vital weekend for Clare hurling.

It symbolised the re-emergence of Clare at the top level of inter-county hurling. Colin Lynch's winning point against Galway two weeks ago reminded everyone of the old days. He powered onto Ollie Baker's break, opened his shoulders and let loose with that distinctive stroke, high and decisive.

One thing that strikes you when pursuing the 'where have they been' line of questioning in Clare is that no one in the county believes that Lynch has been anywhere. To the outside world his galvanic presence, a huge contributory factor in the 1997 successes, hasn't been as evident in the years since Clare's last All-Ireland.

"The public wasn't seeing him. Clare lost first-round matches over the last two years," says Tony Considine, selector along with Ger Loughnane and Michael McNamara in the All-Ireland winning managements. "But for the qualifier system they wouldn't have seen him this year either.

"In '97 the midfield made the team. How many times did you see Ollie Baker and Colin collecting ball on the 21 behind the half backs? Everyone's delighted to see him back. His confidence is sky-high at the moment, which can be seen in his scoring."

Tomorrow's match has a particular resonance for Lynch. Four years ago when Clare last faced Waterford in the championship, all hell broke loose in the replay. A Munster Council investigation led to Lynch being suspended for three months for striking. The council decision and the methodology by which it was reached infuriated Clare.

If there was an impressive aspect to the county's overwrought reaction it was the silence of Lynch at the centre of the maelstrom. Caught in the spotlight of media attention and traduced by the usual clamour of splenetic fruitballs on public access radio, he was also whisked on a tour of the courts in a futile search for an injunction to allow him play.

Through it all he maintained the media silence that has always marked his career. To those on the team he also maintained a reserve. "Look at how he survived all that," says Considine. "He was castigated all over the place. It was desperate that any player should have to go through that. But he never spoke about it, kept it to himself and took his punishment - unfair and all as it was."

The stoicism hides an extrovert personality that informs a strong leadership role within the team. "He's very outgoing," according to former captain Anthony Daly, "and is a great talker in the dressingroom. Not so much on the day of a match although he can cut loose at half-time if he has to. But the week before a match he's very good at talking and getting fellas up to the intensity required."

Lynch missed 1995 with illness and was on the line as Limerick's injury-time comeback tumbled Clare in 1996 - a source of eventual regret to Considine. Ironically, the reservations about him concerned his temperament and discipline. In Loughnane's book Raising the Banner those reservations were made public.

But 1997 coincided with a significant change in Lynch's life. He became serious about his hurling, abandoning his occasional dalliances with soccer and even the football panel. He was foremost a footballer with Lissycasey and had to find a hurling club - initially Éire Óg in Ennis before settling with Kilmaley, the traditional hurling partners of Lissycasey.

He also amended his lifestyle, stopped socialising and trained like a demon to give his hurling career every chance to take off - which it did vertically that year.

Always a decent hurler, he sharpened his game and now his annual rhythms are completely in tune with the demands of hurling.

"You can see his hurling during the League," says Daly. "His touch is terrible and his striking poor. This year against Limerick in the quarter-final when Clare were pathetic his touch was dreadful. That's because he puts in the work getting himself into physical shape.

"He's a great trainer and will demand that level from those all around him. But he'll work on his hurling non-stop when the League is over. These nights I'd say you'd find him down in the handball alleys at St Flannan's, practising." The second weekend in August. Time for hurling.