The second coming of a Kerry totem
JUST past the 23rd minute of last Sunday’s Super 8 encounter in Fitzgerald Stadium, when it still had the semblance of a contest, David Moran went off on a run with ball in hand, shrugging off Donal Vaughan’s attention and splitting the posts from 40 yards out.
Trotting back to his station at centre field, he would then catch David Clarke’s kick-out above Aidan O’Shea’s head. That 45-second spell during his imperious first-half display epitomised everything that is good about the big Tralee native.
Moran delivered his best performance in a Kerry shirt since destroying Mayo in the 2014 All-Ireland semi-final replay, an evening when he had possession of the football 47 times. He merely had hold of it 33 times last Sunday, but he always went forward with it. And his kick-passing was a joy.
His contribution was all the more noteworthy because, as Oisín McConville observed in the RTÉ commentary, Moran had come into the game under a bit of pressure. That’s simply part of the deal when you play midfield for Kerry.
But there has always been a perception with Moran that he is more highly-regarded outside
of the Kingdom than within his own county.
He’s suffered because of who he is not. Despite his size and strength, Moran is not a ‘fear láidir’ in the mould of Darragh Ó Sé. The argy-bargy with Aidan O’Shea prior to throw-in in Killarney is about as aggressive as Moran tends to get in games. He has always been more of a footballer than a warrior. It was Adrian Spillane going to war on the ground that allowed Moran to be majestic in the air.
Moran has endured a stopstart year. After getting married last winter, he missed out on a raft of pre-season training because he was on honeymoon. And he suffered a knee injury during the National League which knocked him back.
However, it is when he has a point to prove that Moran comes to the fore and leads this Kerry team into battle.
He did it in the Gaelic Grounds in that epic semi-final against Mayo. And he did it last Sunday again. But even allowing for his horrific catalogue of injuries, some feel that those kind of days have been too few and far between in his Kerry career.
It is now 11 years since Moran, a second-generation star (son of eight-time All-Ireland winner Denis Ógie Moran) in a county where pedigree matters, came on a late substitute in an AllIreland semi-final against Cork and turned the tide of the game. Kerry were getting cleaned out in midfield.
Donnacha O’Connor had just hit the equaliser with time almost up. The next kick-out was claimed by Moran which set the platform for Colm Cooper’s winning strike.
In the manner in which he altered that All-Ireland semifinal against the Rebels, the young Moran looked like Darragh Ó Sé’s heir apparent.
He remained on the fringes of the Kerry team the following summer, however, with Tadhg Kennelly on his sabbatical from the AFL and Seamus Scanlon established as Ó Sé’s partner in the middle. Moran had to be content with four appearances off the bench on his way to claiming his first Celtic Cross.
That winter, he headed off to Australia with his good friend and Kerins O’Rahilly’s clubmate Tommy Walsh for trials with the AFL. Walsh was kept by Sydney Swans while Moran went home. He has regularly talked in interviews that he would have liked to have tested himself as a professional athlete in Aussie Rules but it wasn’t to be.
It looked like he was returning to a ready-made role with Kerry. Ó Sé retired after the 2009 season but Moran couldn’t force himself into the Kingdom midfield and found himself fourth in the queue behind Scanlon, Mike Quirke and Anthony Maher.
He only started one Championship game in 2010, at wingforward against Cork.
And then came the injuries. Moran endured three horrific seasons and didn’t feature for Kerry from March 2011, when he ruptured his cruciate ligament for against Monaghan in the League, until August 2013.
He was returning from his cruciate ligament injury when he ruptured it for a second time, training with his club in Tralee. He refused to believe that he had done it again and went out training with Kerry a few days later when his knee collapsed.
He had shoulder problems and hamstring strains as he slowly worked his way back to full fitness before disaster struck in a challenge game with Laois ahead of the 2013 Championship when a finger in the eye meant Moran suffered a detached retina that required surgery.
Those three seasons of hell meant that when Moran delivered that wonderful performance against Mayo in 2014, Kerry people had been waiting a long time to see it. In the past couple of years, as Kerry have stuttered, Moran hasn’t exerted the same authority in midfield.
In the 2017 replayed All-Ireland semi-final, Moran found himself hustled out of the game by Seamie O’Shea, who appeared from the bench at half-time last Sunday. However, last Sunday was a sign that Moran is determined to take on the responsibility of being the leader that Kerry have lacked in recent seasons. And he is doing so through leading by example.
Of course, this Sunday may be the greatest examination yet of those credentials because Moran may be going up against Michael Murphy.
The Donegal captain was just as imperious in Ballybofey as Moran was in Killarney.
Their battle in the middle third could well decide this eagerlyanticipated Super 8 fixture.
And, if Moran emerges on top, there may be a sense that he can still lead Kerry to glory.
‘Always more of a footballer than a warrior’