MUNSTER SHC SEMI-FINAL:  Ian O'Riordan on the man who has gone in a few months from fringe panellist to first-choice free-taker in the new, improved Clare team

IN THE days after Clare's shock yet decisive win over Waterford in the Munster hurling quarter-final, news emerged that their forward Mark Flaherty had sustained a hand injury, possibly breaking a bone. This sent the Clare hurling forums into overdrive.

If any one player represented the changing face and fortunes of Clare hurling of late, it was Flaherty. In the space of a few months the 21-year-old had gone from fringe panellist to first-choice corner forward and number-one free-taker - his consistency and accuracy with the placed ball just part of a package that included pace, style and the all-important size and strength.

Throughout the league, Flaherty sent out warning signals of his potential: in Clare's opening match, against Galway, he hit 3-8, including two unstoppable goals from 20-metre frees; against Laois he hit 1-12; against Offaly he hit 1-9; and in the draw with the eventual champions, Tipperary, he hit 0-10 of Clare's total 0-17, not missing a placed ball all day.

There was inevitable pressure on Flaherty on his championship debut for the showdown against Waterford, particularly as Clare were seeking a first Munster championship win in five years.

Flaherty simply rose to the occasion, hitting the opening goal on 16 minutes and ending up with a tidy 1-7. Clare had found the missing piece of their forward line.

So, as news of Flaherty's injury spread around Clare, so too did the fretting. Fortunately for him, it turned out to be just muscle bruising on the back of the hand, and - much to the relief of the manager, Mike McNamara - he is ready to take the field in Semple Stadium for tomorrow's semi-final with Limerick.

McNamara has always taken a keen interest in Flaherty, given he was among the first to become aware of his talents. Flaherty hails from the parish of Killanena in the quiet, hilly area of north Clare, close to the Galway border, and not far from McNamara's own place in Scariff.

In this part of Clare hurling country that includes Feakle, Crusheen and Whitegate, special talent rarely goes unnoticed, and since his earliest days playing with the county under-16s and the divisional league side North Clare, Flaherty was being watched.

He spent two years with the county minors before graduating to the Clare under-21s, but it was with his club Killanena, an intermediate side only fresh out of the junior ranks, that Flaherty first started to shine.

In the past two years, Killanena have just missed promotion to the senior championship, losing the intermediate final first to Clooney-Quinn, by two points, and then to Clonlara, by a point.

Clooney-Quinn and Clonlara went on to win Munster intermediate club titles.

"Mark was running up huge scores in all those games," says Séamus Hayes of the Clare Champion. "He'd be averaging 12 or 13 points a game, and he first really came to notice there. He'd be a very modest player, very quiet, but very committed as well."

Clare assistant secretary Des Crowe, formerly the long-serving press officer, has also been aware of Flaherty's talent.

"Well, he hasn't quite come out of the blue," says Crowe. "Killenana is a small rural club with a very small panel of players - the bare 19 or 20, really - to make up a team. But they've been desperately unlucky not to get promoted to the senior championship.

"Like any small club, the best player is usually put around midfield or centre forward, and that's where Flaherty plays with the club. But he has always been taking the frees as well.

"He's a very quiet, unassuming guy as well, no doubt about that, but at the same time when it comes to it, he's well able to turn on the style and confidence. He's just not the kind of player to get carried away, in any way."

Flaherty misses out on this year's Clare under-21s by just a couple of weeks, and having recently completed his studies at Galway-Mayo Institute of Technology (GMIT), where he also played Fitzgibbon Cup, he can focus solely for now on the Clare seniors.

McNamara had no hesitation in starting him against Waterford, despite his relative inexperience, as Flaherty's influence on the team in fact extends beyond his own sector at number 15.

Niall Gilligan has clearly been helped by liberation from the pressures of free-taking, which appeared to be crowding his game; he enjoyed one of his better championship performances of recent years in the match against Waterford, adding Clare's second goal and also hitting two points from play.

Tony Carmody, Diarmuid McMahon and Tony Griffin also seem more relaxed around the most composed Clare forward line in a number of years, and in the end nine different players contributed to the 2-26 score against Waterford.

While no one in Clare has been blind to the obvious problems in the Waterford defence that day, it was a telling statistic, a range and depth of scoring Clare have not enjoyed in a while.

No team has ever won a Munster hurling title, let alone an All-Ireland, without an accurate and reliable free-taker.

Flaherty's introduction to the Clare team this summer has at least removed the concerns about that shortcoming, whatever about the rest.

"Killanena is a good 30 or so miles from Ennis," adds Crowe, "and I saw Mark in Cusack Park on his own there quite recently. He'd come in to practise frees on his own. That's the kind of commitment he has."