Somewhere in Croke Park yesterday afternoon there was a classic game trapped inside the form of a slog. Waterford came and played the most fluent hurling we've seen in Croke Park. They played it for about 10 minutes. Scored seven points. Tom Humphries reports from Croke Park

Then Clare got their hands on the throat of the game.

The All-Ireland final on September 8th will be graced by Clare for the first time in five years. The team, who revitalised hurling with their breakthrough in 1995, are back for another shot at the big one. At least some of them are. For a team which has been criticised often for being slow to change, only five of yesterday's starters played in the final of seven years ago.

Yesterday was a day not untypical of others Clare gave us in their pomp. The achievement was built on destructive genius, much of the best hurling was done by Clare's full back Brian Lohan and his long-time confederate Seán MacMahon.

Between them the two old hands from the Loughnane revolution crushed the pulse out of Waterford. Clare play like large snakes eat. They squeeze the life out of their prey, get their jaws around them and then swallow them whole. By the time we reached the break yesterday Clare were a point ahead. Waterford, still feeling dizzy from that extraordinary opening, could only rub their heads and wonder how it was all done.

The answer was simple. Clare had moved up a gear, tightened the marking and produced a goal from Alan Markham minutes before the break. Psychologically speaking Waterford we're being knocked about a little.

"For us to be ahead at half-time," said Clare manager Cyril Lyons, "it was criminal really, after the hurling that Waterford had done."

Imagine how they felt in the Waterford dressing-room. Justin McCarthy, who managed the team through this year's surprising success, was philosophical afterwards. "We missed a few chances to go further ahead. We had a lot of wides, and fair play to Clare, there wasn't much in it at the end. These things happen."

Waterford, for whom the novelty of the big time is greater, brought the best part of the 57,724 crowd with them. The doubts which surrounded them before yesterday concerned their nerve and their ring rust. Would they be overwhelmed by Croke Park? Would the six weeks since their fine Munster title win have dulled their edge. From the start Waterford gave the answer. No and no.

It was the sort of hurling that every coach dreams of. Eoin Kelly was picking up all loose ball in the middle third of the field. Picking it up and converting it for points. Three in the first few minutes, each one drawing delirium from all around Croke Park. It was the more unexpected and more fundamental question which was to give Waterford trouble. When the going got tough, Waterford couldn't keep going. When Clare started hanging tough in front of their own goal, those physically big players among the Waterford attack never weighed in. And so Clare grew in stature and rediscovered the belief in themselves which they seemed to have misplaced over the past few seasons.

"It's a legacy of the Ger Loughnane era," said Lyons generously afterwards, "that belief that Clare hurlers have in themselves now. It's something that got passed on from that time." And it showed.

Waterford equalised early in the second half but never managed to recover the lead they had lost. Seán McMahon put Clare back in front and then came a key 60 seconds. Tony Carmody picked a nice point for Clare. Waterford swept upfield again and won a free. Paul Flynn popped it wide. There was a feeling that the tide had just turned.

Waterford scored two goals and 23 points in the Munster final as they dismantled All-Ireland champions Tipperary. Yesterday in the wide open prairies of Croke Park they managed almost the same wides total, 17 in all, but their scoring statistics dropped through the floor.

Every time they had the ball they were hunted and harried. Eoin Kelly, who scored three points in the opening minutes, was shackled. The McGrath brothers were hustled into oblivion. Séamus Prendergast never got a smell, let alone a taste.

There was a incident early in the second half which was indicative of how things changed. John Mullane won possession out on the left. He looked to throw in a dodge and thieve a point. The Clare backs buffeted and badgered him out over the sideline, however. From the second he got the ball to hand they were snapping about him hungrily.

So Clare proceed to another All-Ireland final, becoming the first success story of the new qualifying series era in hurling. Their progress this year will be watched with interest. Since losing to Tipperary in May they have met Dublin, Wexford and Galway in the space of a few weeks.

The main benefit has been in attack. Clare still aren't fluid scorers, but five championship matches already this year have certainly loosened them up a little and they no longer depend on James O'Connor to haul them through big games. Except for the difficulties which Niall Gilligan had finding his range yesterday their forwards all chipped in admirably.

At midfield the partnership of Reddan and Lynch coped well after the early scare. With a month to go till the All-Ireland final and the prospect of playing one or other of the teams that Clare retain a chip on their shoulder about, they'll be quietly confident, although that wasn't the official message yesterday.

"It'll either be Tipperary, who have beaten us for a few years now, or Kilkenny who beat us well in the league," said James O'Connor dolefully. "Two teams who would be most peoples favourites for the All-Ireland and who a lot of people would like to see playing each other."

"For us to be ahead at half-time, it was criminal really, after the hurling that Waterford had done." - Clare manager Cyril Lyons

On a fine day at headquarters there were only a couple of notes which struck the wrong key. The Croke Park pitch was as perfect as it has been in recent months, apart from an unwanted splash of colour provided late on Saturday night when some vandals were apprehended attempting to spoil the pitch with paint and shovels.

And the day began on a sad note with news of the death of Mick Dunne, one of the key figures of GAA journalism in the last century. Mick was in Croke Park as recently as last Monday for the Dublin and Donegal football quarter-final. In a long and illustrious career he had been GAA correspondent of the old Irish Press and the first GAA correspondent of RTÉ. Mick was instrumental in the setting up of the All Stars scheme in 1971 and for many years was one of the key faces of GAA on RTÉ screens.

In a statement on behalf of the GAA, the association's president, Seán McCague, noted that Dunne's "abiding passion was handball, a game which he played for a long time and which he helped tirelessly to promote.

"He'll be sadly missed and our thoughts are with his wife Lily and family."