Leinster SFC First round - Kildare 0-12 Wicklow 0-5:YOU HALF expect a game like this in the opening round of the championship, although that doesn't make it any easier to watch. Pretty it was not, and even Mick O'Dwyer, famous for dressing up football in sugar-coated rhyme, described his losing Wicklow performance as "shocking".
Kildare duly set up a quarter-final date against what looks like an increasingly-disjointed Meath camp, with the minimal amount of fuss on their part – and with obvious potential to improve.
Kildare hit five more wides than actual scores, and sent plenty more ball into the hands of their opponents, and yet never once looked like losing. McGeeney’s team still has a lot of polishing to do before regaining the levels of last summer, yet they look willing and hungry enough.
What will have captured attention was the performance of John Doyle at midfield. Named at corner forward, he was switched before the throw-in, and ended up playing a starring role. Hitting four points, three from frees, Doyle covered an extraordinary amount of ground over the 70 minutes – but then he does have the distance-runner’s build, and the endurance to go with it.
The only downside to that was Doyle’s influence as a pure forward was missed. James Kavanagh’s pre-match replacement Alan Smith hit three good points, but other than that Kildare’s overall attack was conspicuous by its absence. Ronan Sweeney has certainly had better days, and the entire half-forward line took a long time to settle.
There wasn’t a whole lot to distinguish the teams in the opening quarter. As the game progressed, however, the gulf in class soon became apparent. Kildare hit seven points without reply in the second half, before Wicklow hit one injury-time consolation free through Leighton Glynn – their only notable contribution to the second half, beyond the straight red card shown to Austin O’Malley six minutes from time.
O’Malley’s switch of allegiance from Mayo looked to be working out okay as he hit two first-half scores that helped keep Wicklow in the game, and only a point down – 0-5 to 0-4 – at half-time.
Yet the frustrations of the day eventually got to him, and when his elbowing of Andrew MacLochlainn was seen in full view of the umpire, he received a straight red.
Kildare would probably have expected to be more than a point ahead at half-time, especially with the wind at their backs. Wicklow’s scoring threat was obviously built around O’Malley, Seánie Furlong and Glynn, and while Glynn was typically industrious with the ball, their actual scoring chances were few and far between.
Instead Wicklow were a lot busier in defence, particularly under the high-ball onslaught of Kildare. Unlike most O’Dywer-coached teams, they reverted to the swarm defence, which eventually just ran out of steam.
Kildare’s wide count had mounted to 10 by half-time. The free-count was low, although the most damning statistic – if anyone was keeping track – was the number of turnovers, both teams repeatedly gave away possession like loose change, and if Wicklow had been a little sharper they might well have taken a more constructive advantage.
Whatever hopes Wicklow had of capitalising on Kildare’s shortcomings in the second half gradually disappeared. Tomás O’Connor extended the lead to two points, but still Kildare remained wasteful – and they only scored twice more, through Smith and Doyle, in the next 20 minutes.
Once O’Malley was dismissed, Kildare finished off with a high-tempo flourish of three scores in the last five minutes, from Doyle, Bolton and Pádraig Fogarty.
KILDARE: 1 S Connolly; 2 A MacLochlainn, 3 M Foley, 4 H McGrillen; 5 G White (0-1, 45), 6 B Flanagan, 7 E Bolton (0-1); 13 J Doyle (0-4,three frees), 9 H Lynch (0-1); 10 M O’Flaherty, 11 E O’Flaherty, 12 P O’Neill; 18 A Smith (0-3), 19 T O’Connor (0-1), 14 R Sweeney. Subs: 15 J Kavanagh for E O’Flaherty (27 mins), 25 E Callaghan for Flanagan (30 mins), 22 P Fogarty (0-1) for Sweeney (48 mins), 27 C Brophy for O’Neill (52 mins), 23 F Dowling for O’Connor (68 mins). Yellow cards: R Sweeney (35 mins); T O’Connor (60 mins), A MacLochlainn (65 mins).
WICKLOW: 1 M Travers; 2 C Hyland, 3 A Byrne, 4 S Kelly; 5 M McLoughlin, 6 B McGrath, 7 D Hayden; 8 J Stafford, 9 R Finn; 10 T Hannon, 11 P Dalton, 12 P Earls; 13 A O’Malley (0-2), 14 S Furlong (0-2, one free), 15 L Glynn (0-1, a free). Subs: 19 C McGraynor Hannon (20 mins), 22 N Mernagh for P Dalton (45 mins), 27 JP Dalton for Finn (64 mins). Yellow cards: J Stafford (39 mins), S Furlong (63 mins). Red cards: A O’Malley (64 mins).
Referee: M Duffy (Sligo), replaced 55 mins by S Doyle (Wexford).
The final first-round game sees Wexford meet Offaly in Tullamore next Saturday. The winner will meet Westmeath on June 12th, the same day that Carlow play Louth in Portlaoise. The other two quarter-finals are a double-header in Croke Park on June 5th, with Kildare meeting Meath and then Laois taking on Dublin.
