The golden horde had thronged Limerick before noon.
Spirits were high. This was the day that Clare were going to end a quarter century of hurt and reclaim their throne as high kings of Munster. 'Up the Banner!'
They had already beaten Limerick in the championship in their own ground once. Why not again?
By half-time, things were going to plan. Brian Lohan’s side led by a goal and could have been further ahead.
But Limerick had other ideas. Writing their own history of five Munsters in a row for a start.
They pulled clear with a post-interval burst and though Clare fought back, the hosts showed why they are champions by holding on to win by a point - 1-23 to 1-22.
"Achieving what they've done today does cut them off as being a particularly special bunch of men," said Treaty manager John Kiely afterwards. "I'm thrilled for them that they have that and it can never be taken from them.
"I think we’ve shown an amazing level of resilience and the hunger and appetite that was questioned is most certainly still there. This is our home patch, this is our backyard, and we’re very proud of our record here.
"One of the things that's been noticeable this year is that our third quarter has been tremendous in terms of energy and in terms of scoring. It's a great trait in a team to come out in what they call the moving quarter and actually move.
"I think we were the better side. We probably could have had a couple mores scores on the board."
Match highlights
Substitutes Cathal O’Neill (0-02) and Adam English (0-01) made game-changing impacts off the bench and Kiely saluted the latter, who was making his senior championship debut 24 hours after the death of his uncle.
"To come and participate today and do what he did – for a young player, I thought that was an incredible achievement for a Munster final and an occasion like today. That just shows you the calibre of the individual that he is."
The Limerick boss and Lohan politely disagreed on whether Liam Gordon should have awarded Clare the opportunity to equalised in the last play of the game, when Peter Casey ran into Tony Kelly off the ball and Will O’Donoghue could have been adjudged to have pulled down Adam Hogan.
"For me, there was no free there," Kiely insisted. "No free. Listen, we were there in ’19 [against Kilkenny] when things don’t go your way in the last minute. You have to suck it up when it doesn’t come your way."
Lohan hadn’t reviewed the incidents when speaking after the game but suggested that Clare "find it very hard to get those kind of frees".
"We don't have that much power, influence or anything like that.
"It's tough for our lads. Is it hard to take? Yeah."
In fairness to Lohan, he also pinpointed a clearer reason for the defeat: "The game is about putting the ball over the bar and when you don’t put it over the bar you don’t win.
"The stats are kind of even, all the puckouts, breaking balls, everything is kind of even apart from shooting efficiency and their shooting efficiency is way better than ours.
"We probably could have done a bit more damage on the scoreboard when we were in a stronger position but we didn’t manage to do that."
The shooting stats also didn’t include the several times Clare overran the ball in Limerick territory when an effort at goal might have been the wiser choice.
In the absence of the injured Conor Cleary, Cian Nolan got taken for 1-03 from play by man of the match Aaron Gillane and could have been subbed off earlier than the 50th minute but as Lohan observed: "Aaron Gillane is probably one of the best forwards in the game at the moment. It's a really tough challenge for anyone that is marking him."
Arguably the bigger reward for Limerick was securing four weeks’ rest after five intense contests in seven weeks.
Kiely said he was "sure" Cian Lynch would be back for the All-Ireland semi-final after another campaign hampered by hamstring trouble and captain Declan Hannon will also welcome the break having limped off after 55 minutes.
"It’s an opportunity for us to recharge," admitted Kiely. "An opportunity for a few guys to get a few little bits and pieces together in terms of their own preparation, fitness levels, knocks and bumps and lumps.
"And just take a break. It’s been a really tough Munster championship. Every team brought their absolute best performance against us every day we went out."
In last year’s preliminary quarter-final, Clare needed a late rally to get out of jail against Wexford and looked jaded by the time they met Kilkenny in the semi-finals.
"We'll try and get ourselves right for two weeks’ time and see how it pans out."
For Lohan, the task now is to pick his players up for a clash on 24 June against Dublin or Carlow, who will be playing on successive weekends.
"You could be gone the next day. You just don’t know," he said.
"That’s the big challenge with the way the championship is structured.
"It’s all go, you don’t really get a chance to recover. You just move on to the next game, so that’s what we have to do now.
"We’ll try and get ourselves right for two weeks’ time and see how it pans out."
Lohan was understandably disappointed but while the Clare fans went home slightly quieter and redder after a sweltering day in Limerick there are still grounds for optimism compared to last year’s extra-time loss.
Then, they gave it everything they had but still lost by a goal over 90 minutes. This time they were only one point worse and with some very poor wides among their 12 it felt more like they had been the architects of their own destruction.
As Kiely noted afterwards: "You have two very evenly matched teams who know each other extremely well and are able to counter the others’ strengths in a very positive way."
The reality is that these two and the Leinster finalists are all very close to each other.
So far this season, Clare beat Limerick by a point, Limerick beat Clare by a point, Kilkenny and Galway drew and Kilkenny beat Galway by a point with a last-minute goal.
Unless Liam Cahill or Micheál Donoghue have something special up their sleeves we are likely to see a repeat of last year’s semi-final pairings.
But despite their apparently greater ability to close out games, a Limerick-Kilkenny final rematch should be no foregone conclusion.
Clare have lost the battle but need to remind themselves that the war is still there to be won.
