HE told the tale in his autobiography.

Three decades later, and 43 years on from that mild September afternoon at Croke Park, we'll let him tell it again.

At all costs, Eddie Keher had decided beforehand, he had to convert the first free he took. Freetakers starting their first All Ireland final always do. But the free that Kilkenny were awarded inside the opening couple of minutes was a tricky one, from an angle out near the sideline. So Keher played the percentages and lobbed it into the Waterford square.

Ninety seconds later an easier free presented itself. He duly knocked it over.

"Now, Eddie, " Fr Tommy Maher had told his protege, hitherto perceived as a handy forward who lacked cutting edge, in the dressing room prior to the 1963 All Ireland final. "Make up your mind to be dug out of these lads."

Keher did and Keher was.

Fourteen points to help Kilkenny to a 4-17 to 6-8 victory, 10 of them from placed balls, the other four from play.

Having cleared his throat when hitting two points as a sub in the 1959 replay, the moment had arrived for the man who would become the leading scorer in championship history with 35-334 from 50 appearances, and the leading scorer in All Ireland hurling final history with 7-74 from 10 appearances, to trumpet his talents from the rooftops. Valhalla, I am coming.

You want to know where Henry Shefflin fits in the pantheon of great Kilkenny forwards? Right at the top, of course. At the top, alongside DJ Carey. At the top but not onthe top. There Eddie Keher stands alone. Shefflin has yet to reach his plinth.

Paddy Buggy, the former GAA president and himself an All Ireland winner in 1957, has seen them all. Shefflin and Carey and Keher. Pat Delaney and Kieran Purcell, colleagues of Keher's on Kilkenny's greatest-ever forward line. Tom Walsh of 1967 misfortune who was, says Buggy, "only coming into his best years at the timef a tremendous loss". Tom Walton, the Tullaroan sharpshooter from 1947. Right back along the line of wristy stick merchants in stripes to Jimmy Langton, the first man to score 100 points in championship hurling.

To Buggy, Langton was "the stylist supreme", Carey the "greatest artist" he's seen on a hurling field . . . but Keher a finer forward than either.

"Langton's striking was beautiful and crisp, he had such rhythm in his arms. He was much the same build as DJ.

Good shoulders, a good pair of hips, not easy to upset. Neither of them was a big man but they were both strong men.

"Keher on the other hand was a big man and one who always rose to the big occasion. If I were asked to pick a man who'd win an All Ireland for you as a forward, I'd go for Keher."

For all that one is wary of engendering statistical snowblindness in the reader, any article that attempts to categorise Shefflin in his local context must not only automatically genuflect to Keher as a reference point but cannot avoid the simultaneous danger of doubling as a homage to the Inistioge man's scoring totals. They were the tools of his trade, the building blocks of his brilliance. As Leo McGough's statistics (see panel) reveal, Keher scored from play in 94 per cent of his championship outings (Shefflin has done likewise in 85 per cent of his and Carey in 79 per cent of his); he scored at least one point from play in 92 per cent of them (Shefflin 82 per cent, Carey an unsurprising 66 per cent); he scored a goal in 34 per cent of them (Shefflin 41 per cent, Carey 37 per cent).

All through his career, Keher did nothing but score.

For seven successive seasons he was the game's leading marksman: 10-85 in 1966, 1365 in '67, 9-76 in '68, 16-77 in '69, 8-70 in 1970, 8-141 in '71 and 20-134 in 1972. To children in 1970s Ireland, among them the Saw Doctors, who namechecked him in a song, Keher was the man. It is under his oaken shadow that Carey and Shefflin have hurled. It is to their credit that each in his different way . . . Carey with his goals, Shefflin with his allround excellence . . . has emerged from it. Continuations of history, not captives of it. "For his consummate artistry, the poise and grace he brings to his chosen sport, " Keher's first All Star citation read. It is a line that would rest as lightly on the shoulders of the other two.

Particularly, of late, on Shefflin's shoulders. He's himself again. A vignette. In the dying minutes of last year's All Ireland semi-final, an unmarked Shefflin pulled on a ball that dropped behind the Galway defence and, as if to give credence to the notion that he was "not the same man" since the Gerry Quinn episode the previous season, connected with fresh air. In the opening minutes of last month's All Ireland semi-final, an unmarked Shefflin pulled on a ball that dropped behind the Clare defence and stitched it. History does not record how many of the Mayo fans stayed on after the preceding All Ireland quarter-final with Laois to catch some or more of the hurling, but it's not fanciful to imagine that a proportion of those who did were motivated by the desire to see the Ballyhale man in the flesh.

Ask Keher to talk about Shefflin's strengths and he responds with a, "God, what are his weaknesses? All the things you'd love to have as a hurler, he has them. Left and right, on the ground, frees.

But the ability he has that I admire the most is his reading of the game and the way he just ghosts away from the opposition backs to appear in the right place at the right time. One minute the play is out around midfield, the next minute the ball is inside and Henry has lost his marker to take the pass. And his finishing is superb." An obvious caveat follows. "We can't expect him to score 1-13 every day and we don't. But that means that all six forwards must play as a unit."

Brian Cody played with one member of Kilkenny's holy trinity and managed the other two. On Keher: "When you're a young lad breaking onto the team, you just want to get your place and play. But obviously getting to play with Eddie Keher was a huge thing to me and to all of us."

On DJ: "I've said many times that it was a privilege to work with him. An outstanding talent, yes, but to me he was a huge team player. He was the superstar of hurling of his time, acknowledged by everyone to be, yet he was the most unselfish player you could find. He had everything, and his willingness to work for the team was among his greatest attributes." On Shefflin: "I couldn't see that one comingf Very like DJ, really.

An outstanding player, but again it's his willingness to get out there and play for and work for the team. He trains like any young fella trying to break onto the team."

Lucky the manager. Lucky the county.