Inconsistency is Kerry’s only constant

Paul Brennan was in Breffni Park to see another inconsistent performance from Kerry which is, at best, frustrating for the management and players

THOSE of a certain vintage may recall an ad campaign for a certain stout that ran with the tag-line ‘consistency in a world gone mad’. We’re not sure how or if the campaign boosted sales of the black stuff but there was an assuredness in the slogan that suggested the best one should hope for, or expect, in a shifting and shifty world is consistency. Can we, therefore, extrapolate that a lack of consistency could drive you mad? AFTER six games of the Football League the one constant we can say of the Kerry team thus far is they have been inconsistency. Inconsistent from game to game and within games. The last 10 days and the 74 minutes against Cavan are the perfect illustration of that.

Last Saturday week Kerry were ‘on it’ against Dublin. Whatever one may think of the rough-house antics in Austin Stack Park, at least Kerry cane say they approached that game in a determined manner. They took the game to Dublin. They weren’t going to bullied by Dublin and they weren’t going to stop going to the very end. Sure, they coughed up a two-point lead in additional time but all things considered Kerry could be satisfied that they went toe to tow with the League and All-Ireland champions for over 70 minutes.

Last Sunday against Cavan Kerry brought little, in any, of that fizz and fight to Breffni Park. It’s understandable that given everything that was on the line against Dublin - unbeaten records, recent rivalry, personal duels to settle - the Kerry team collectively were never going to get to that level of intensity against Cavan last weekend but they didn’t even come close. Had they, you’d have to belief they’d have left Breffni Park with both League points. Instead Kerry were possible spared a beating only for Cavan’s woeful scoring attempts in the first half; though it must be said that Kerry’s missed almost as much over the course of the match.

Kerry’s second half against Cavan was much better than the first (though they did lose the half by 0-7 to 1-6) but that merely highlights the inconsistency within games. One half good, one half bad. It happened against Mayo in Tralee and with Monaghan in Killarney. Even the performance against Donegal saw Kerry well on top for 45 minutes and then struggling a little to protect their lead in the final quarter. Even against Roscommon a comfortable second half lead was squandered away to a point before a late push redeemed Kerry somewhat.

Of course every team will hit

speed bumps within matches but that’s two two-point leads Kerry have thrown away in additional time in the last two games. Manager Eamonn Fitzmaurice sought a silver lining in Cavan when he suggested that a couple of years ago a Kerry team would have lost that game, but there must surely be more than a modicum of anxiety at a recurring theme, notwithstanding the reasonable excuse (not offered by Fitzmaurice, by the way) that a number of regulars were missing and still to come back in. “I think above all today we’d be disappointed with our performance more than anything. The result, look, we got out of it what we deserved. We didn’t deserve anymore,” Fitzmaurice said. “I think the positive thing you’d say is that a couple of years ago we’d probably have lost that game when we weren’t playing as well as we probably needed to and we ground something out and at least we got a point out of it. Overall, yeah, we’d be disappointed with the way we played. We didn’t back up last weekend and we just have to circle the wagons now and get ready for next weekend. It’s hard to explain it.

On the specific enquiry regarding the inconsistency from game to game the manager said: “It is frustrating for everyone. I’m sure the lads are frustrated as well because we had been going well for the last couple of weeks. We had a good away win to Roscommon, we came close to winning (against Dublin), didn’t quite get the job done, and you’d like to see that graph continue upwards. The big thing from our point of view is we didn’t lose the game and that’s a game we would have lost before.”

Speaking on Sunday it wasn’t known what way the final round of games were going to play out regarding relegations and League final spots but the Kerry manager was sure of one thing.

“Tyrone is a huge game,” he said of Mickey Harte’s team visit on Sujnday. “Every game is a must win and all the games in Division One are going to be very tough and playing against Tyrone in Killarney next weekend will be a great occasion. They could be really gunning looking for a League final spot.”