Manager Brian Cody rounded on critics of his ageing Kilkenny defence and, in particular, of full-back JJ Delaney after the Cats' 2-17 to 2-14 victory over Tipperary in the All-Ireland SHC final replay at Croke Park.
Cody's 10th All-Ireland success as manager will ultimately be remembered as the one when Henry Shefflin entered the history books as a 10-time winning player.
But Cody admitted one of the game's defining moments was actually 32-year old defender Delaney's 18th minute hook on Seamus Callanan.
Full-forward Callanan still finished with 2-05 but Delaney's last-gasp hook averted a goal concession at a crucial stage of the game.
Ironically, pundits had suggested that several of Kilkenny's thirty-something defenders, including Delaney, may be past their best after last year's early Championship exit.
"As we're so often told, our defenders are very, very slow and for JJ Delaney, who’s meant to be old and beat at this stage and can't run, to get back and hook a player who, in your (the media's) opinion, and who is actually a speed merchant. Look we work a lot on speed to keep them quick," said Cody.
"You'd want to know what you're writing about when you're writing those things before you slaughter them. You'd want to realise it doesn't work like that."
Cody said his team's defending generally “was absolutely magnificent” though inevitably much of the post-match discussion centred on Shefflin's remarkable achievement.
"Henry's achievement is the one to talk about," said Cody when asked about his own 10th win as manager.
"The manager is still as young as ever. The player himself gets older and it's a different thing. He's challenged in every single possible way, not so much in a psychological way, but in a physical way because he has gone through the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, obviously, with injury and to be here still at this level and to be challenging for his place, absolutely challenging, and then to have deserved to achieve his 10th All-Ireland on the field of play, that's just mind boggling stuff.
"I thought for a while it might never be done again but there's a few lads coming behind him, they're creeping up as well. It's just a magnificent time for Henry and those other players."
