Kilkenny match-winner Cillian Buckley admitted that he thought the game was beyond his side before he stepped up to hit a stunning goal with the final puck of the ball, as the Cats beat Galway to win the Leinster title.
Galway held a two-point lead with just seconds left in added time at Croke Park before Buckley struck to break their hearts after a rushed kicked clearance by Galway defender Padraic Mannion sent the sliotar straight to an unmarked Buckley who found the bottom corner of the net.
Speaking to RTÉ Sport, Buckley underlined just how much the goal and the title meant to him, adding that to scoring the winner in Croke Park was a "dream come true".
He said: "I don’t get into that position too often, I knew there was only a few seconds late and being honest I looked for a pass. I looked again and it wasn't on. I shot, and I’ll call it a shot, and I managed to get it in.
"Talk about special moments. To do that for your team, among your team and to win the Leinster final, it's just savage, it’s a dream come true.
"It opens up the year for us now and we're over the moon in there, Leinster champions. For what it does for us now, it's just savage.
"We came here to win silverware today, to win our provincial championship to win the Bob O’Keefe.
"We'll celebrate that today and but yeah look no doubt about it there's benefits to the four-week run in to a semi-final.
"But a Leinster medal? You’ll never turn you back on it and that will definitely be celebrated first."
GOAL KILKENNY - Cillian Buckley with the last, dramatic act of the game snatches victory for Kilkenny in the Leinster final. The Cats win 4-21 to 2-26
— The Sunday Game (@TheSundayGame) June 11, 2023
⌨️Updates: https://t.co/SrTqTcm8O4
📺Watch: https://t.co/AKAre5FHdN #sundaygame pic.twitter.com/xwXWQrYjOp
Kilkenny let slip an eight-point 50th minute lead to trail going into the final seconds and by that stage Buckley believed that his side had thrown the game away.
"I think both teams had their purple patch and I came on there with 10 minutes ago," he said. "We were a few points up and for Galway to go ahead, I did think it was gone to be honest.
"But I think some huge players from the lads, I’m thinking Tommy Welsh, Hughie Lawlor, Mikey Butler in the back line there. Galway could have been further ahead and it could have been beyond and all last-minute goal there and they were just phenomenal.
"That's what you want from your team, to be in the game in the dying seconds. Something like that happens there today and we came out with the result.
"I can't say I've practised too many of them and maybe that showed. But look, it opened up. I said let's go for it here, 75th minute of a Leinster final – there’s more behind me than ahead of me now.
"I said I'd take it on and as I said it’s a dream come true, just to celebrate with the lads. There was a pile on there at the end and I’ll never forget it honestly, and even with my family there at the end.
"I’ve been playing with Kilkenny 12 years and it’s special."
