Kerry 1-14 Dublin 0-11:NOW DUBLIN have been fully briefed. Winning an All-Ireland after 16 years is in one way an end itself but five months after every September comes February and the transformative mysteries of being champions. For the past two years Dublin had been hungrily matching themselves against the best, eager to measure their rising capacity.
On Saturday in Croke Park, before an attendance of 45,836 on the opening night of the NFL, Pat Gilroy’s team in a sense became the benchmark and struggled to meet that standard. “In a sense” because Kerry are so perennial, so aware of football fortune as a continuum rather than a pattern of well spaced-out peaks that you could almost feel the knowing scepticism in the ranks of green and gold.
As the beaten All-Ireland finalists limbered up in the gloom of a Croke Park temporarily unlit – the better to showcase the fireworks which greeted Dublin to the now obligatory Thin Lizzy soundtrack – they waited to test their hosts’ newly-acquired status.
And sure enough the visitors showed more urgency from the eager youngsters introduced for audition to the unflagging veteran Tomás Ó Sé who got through the customary amount of work and hard running and ran out comfortable winners while also accumulating an impressive 17 wides.
There were mitigating circumstances. Dublin were more under-strength than Kerry, missing four All Stars – albeit two of them were introduced before the end. It’s hardly an industrial secret that their attack is not an elite force without Alan and Bernard Brogan (as coincidentally had been demonstrated in the team’s previous league match, last year’s final).
But Kerry were also short their most important player, Colm Cooper. Furthermore Jack O’Connor brought in a greater range of young players, all of whom, especially corner backs Shane Enright and Peter Crowley, played encouragingly. Craig Dias did well for Dublin but he was the team’s only debutant.
Tomás Quinn had a goal chance in the opening seconds but apart from a feisty second quarter when they established a half-time lead, 0-7 to 0-5, Dublin ceded initiative and were chasing the match.
Kevin McManamon was busy and strong running as usual and kicked three points, the one after half-time from the same position as his goal of last September. On this occasion the ball flew over the bar when a goal would have sustained Dublin’s challenge for most of the second half.
Supplied with abundant possession, Kerry’s forwards gradually turned the screw. Darran O’Sullivan’s pace and Paul Galvin’s constructive use of the ball in the half forwards opened up opportunity and the young corner forwards James O’Donoghue and Barry John Keane were lively and threatening and Dublin’s defence although at nearly full strength yielded up the frees, from which Bryan Sheehan took Kerry clear.
Kieran Donaghy’s renewed duel with Rory O’Carroll was going the Dubliner’s way but the switch of Donaghy to the wing and especially the introduction of Patrick Curtin to the full-forward line intensified the pressure.
It was Curtin who picked out Darran O’Sullivan galloping into space for the 55th-minute goal, which effectively ended the match at 1-10 to 0-9. Dublin nibbled away at the lead without making inroads and replacement centrefielder Eamonn Fennell was sent off in the 67th minute for a gratuitous and dangerous frontal charge on Sheehan.
“I thought all of our young lads played very well,” reflected Jack O’Connor. “Crowley and Enright were very tenacious at the back and James O’Donoghue was very lively and Barry John Keane. It was a great game for those young fellas to get in the month of February up in Croke Park.
“We need to keep finding players. We’ve had a big turnover since 2009, something like seven or eight new players and if you’re going to stay on the road you have to keep finding new players.”
Pat Gilroy blamed diminishing work rate, poor concentration and a catalogue of mistakes. “Our effort in the second half wasn’t what it should have been. We were very good in the first half and worked very hard. I suppose our use of the ball was terrible – the amount of balls we kicked away were really unforced errors and I think that really knocked the stuffing out of us. Particularly as the second half wore on.
“Some of the stuff was just silly mistakes and then our work rate just dropped and they got completely on top in the middle of the field in the first 20 minutes of the second half.”
KERRY: B Kealy; P Crowley, M Ó Sé, S Enright; T Ó Sé, K Young, B Maguire; S Scanlon, B Sheehan (0-8, 0-5 frees); P Galvin, Darran O’Sullivan (1-0), S O’Sullivan; J O’Sullivan (0-3, 0-2 frees), K Donaghy, BJ Keane (0-3). Subs: A Maher for Scanlon (half-time), P Curtin for S O’Sullivan (50 mins), D O’Callaghan for D O’Sullivan (61 mins), A O’Mahony for Crowley (66 mins), D Bohan for Keane (71 mins).
DUBLIN: S Cluxton (0-2, 45 and free); M Fitzsimons, R O’Carroll, P McMahon; J McCarthy, G Brennan, C Dias; R McConnell, MD Macauley; B Cullen (0-1), K McManamon (0-3), P Brogan; D Connolly (0-1), E O’Gara, T Quinn (0-4, 0-3 frees). Subs: P Flynn for Brogan (44 mins), E Fennell for McConnell (51 mins), K Nolan for Fitzsimons (51 mins), D Kelly for O’Gara (63 mins), S Murray for Macauley (64 mins).
Referee: M Deegan (Laois).
