Kerry cannot afford to slip further behind
REALLY, all that was missing in Austin Stack Park last Saturday evening was some classic Bizet. If a chorus or two from the twinkly-toed French maestro’s ‘Carmen Jones’ echoed its way across the field then maybe, possibly, who knows...Kerry might just have been able to tip Dublin over the edge. Though the champs had so many of their own supporters down south with them and proudly clad in blue that it’s no sure thing which team on the field might have thought they were being fed some late and vital instruction. ‘Stand up and fight until you hear the bell, Stand toe to toe, trade blow for blow, Keep punching till you make your punches tell, Show the crowd what you know! Until you hear that bell, that final bell, Stand up and fight like hell!’
It works splendidly for Munster. How many of those tantalising victories in Thomond Park have been dredged up with those words ringing in the ears of Mick Galwey and Paul O’Connell in the past, and now Peter O’Mahony?
On the other hand, it can be argued that Kerry and Dublin did not need any further encouragement to get down and dirty, and do whatever had to be done, to get a result in Tralee.
It ended 13 points apiece in a dissatisfying draw for the home team, but one that appeared quite acceptable to Jim Gavin’s crew who, despite publicly snubbing the question of reaching out for history and equalling the ancient record of 34 games unbeaten, made quite a fuss in the second half. This, clearly, was a game Dublin did not want to lose.
The game ended in a draw, so who won the fight?
Again, it looked pretty much level pegging in that contest over the 70 minutes, though Kerry would have edged the verdict, if the fight was actually being judged, because of their clearly higher aggression level. Winning eight of referee Sean Hurson’s yellow cards, nobody could argue that they didn’t dominate the meaner arts of the evening. And Kerry needed that. Though what they really needed was to push the visitors around the place and win the game itself — Éamonn Fitzmaurice’s men had lost 10 of their previous 12 League and Championship games to Dublin, including the costly matter of two All-Ireland finals and two semi-finals.
Fitzmaurice should be furious with his own men this last week. They had half-decent goal chances, they led by four points after 48 minutes when Paul Geaney failed with a simple enough free that would have head-butted Dublin psychologically (0-10 to 0-5 would have made it double scores on the board), and, in added time, Paul Murphy failed to mind a one-point advantage (and a certain win) with his life. His errant free across his own half-back line led to Paul Mannion leveling the game 30 seconds later.
So, Geaney and Murphy should be first up in getting an earful from their manager. In Geaney’s case that might appear a little extreme since he kicked four frees and another three points from play, but he’s there (as the team’s No1 attacker) to nail the opposing defence. He failed the game’s biggest moment.
And after being scapegoated in last year’s All-Ireland semi-final and foolishly substituted by Fitzmaurice late on, he also failed to put down a marker with his manager to never even think of doubting him again with a game on the line.
Murphy, however, should be in much bigger trouble with his manager — and also his team-mates.
The game was over. Dublin had given it their all to turn a fourpoint deficit into a two-points lead, then Kerry had come back at them and duly turned a twopoint deficit into a two-point lead of their own. Forget about the scoreboard; forget about the fighting. It was time to lock down the game.
The game was in its dying seconds when Dean Rock brought the margin back to one. Then Eoghan O’Gara gave away one of those daft frees he likes to throw into his performances by high tackling Peter Crowley from behind.
It was a free that should have been as acceptable as a small lottery win. It halted Dublin’s momentum. It used up some time. It allowed Kerrymen to calmly ready themselves to simply keep the ball for the few remaining seconds.
And Murphy goes and blows it.
He’s still a young man but he’s been in a Kerry jersey long enough to know better. Also, he’s trusted as the team’s ‘maker and shaker’, now that he is being utilised as a roaming figure around the middle rather than a fluid and attacking half-back. Clearly, as a footballer, Murphy has not grown up sufficiently.
Crowley, the man who took the decking from O’Gara, could be seen mouthing one word — beginning with the letter f and ending with ak — as the referee blasted his final whistle.
Fitzmaurice’s words, however, for everyone in his dressing room should also have been choice. They did everything they needed to do to put a dent in Dublin’s early season, and also to start a new chapter in more recent Kerry-Dublin relations.
Instead, they won the fighting, David Moran brilliantly edged Brian Fenton in the possession stakes in the biggest head-to-head of the evening, and they broke through Dublin’s defensive lines often enough — but no visible dent.
Hopefully, this is not a gut-wrenching draw for Kerry. But there is the possibility that having done everything but win the game against a Dublin team still not fully manned up, they will think of Croke Park in late summer as a place holding an infinitely sterner examination of their worth.
This week Kerry clearly stand as the No2 team in the country. To remain in that position for the next few months they have to maintain their highest standards against Cavan and Monaghan over the next eight days, and remain in with a shout to succeed Dublin as League champions. They cannot take a single step back now.
The last step back they took was in the final seconds of last Saturday evening’s game, and any more slipping into a reverse gear, might leave Kerry looking like imposters with a big punch.