Kerry could mathematically avoid drop with four points

FORGET, if you will, that Kerry’s chance of retaining their National League title vanished with last Sunday’s loss to Dublin: the 2017 League champions are now in the bottom half of the division and in a small bit of a relegation struggle with two rounds of games remaining.

As it stands, Kildare and Donegal are in greatest danger of dropping down to Division Two for next season, but Kerry, Tyrone and Mayo will all be looking for one more win - or a couple of draws - to take them to six points and ensure absolute safety from the drop.

In Kerry’s case just one more point and a finishing tally of five League points would be good enough to keep them safe from the trap-door. It could even be possible that Kerry could lose their last two games and still survive relegation, but that would require an incredible series of results and precise score lines over the last two rounds, that would be akin to picking the six winning Lotto numbers.

Kerry’s 12-point defeat by Dublin last weekend (coupled with Mayo’s seven-point win over Kildare) saw the champions tumble down to sixth place on the table by virtue of a worse scoring difference to Mayo and Tyrone. That poor scoring difference is what could come against Kerry when the final standings come to pass, but as has been the case over the last number of Division One campaigns, almost nothing has been decided in terms of finalists or relegation after five rounds.

All that is known at this stage is that Galway are qualified for the League Final as they are guaranteed to finish in the top two placings, and while Dublin are odds on to join them, Monaghan still have a chance albeit remote - of getting into that top two to face Galway in the April 1 final.

From Kerry’s perspective, a win or a draw over Kildare in Tralee on Saturday evening would ensure the Kingdom stay in the top-flight in 2018. That would leave Kerry with five points going into the final round of games, and no matter what other combination of results were to occur over Rounds 6 and 7, the worst Kerry could do would be finish second to bottom with either Mayo or Donegal, in which case Kerry’s head to head win over both of those would see them survive.

Defeat to Kildare would, of course, send Kerry north to Omagh the following Sunday needing to beat or draw with Tyrone to keep their Division One status, but it is conceivable that defeats to Kildare and Tyrone might still not relegate the reigning League champions.

It would require Kerry losing those two games by just one point each - taking Kerry’s scoring difference to -15. It would also require Kildare to win their final game against Galway by exactly one point, taking the Lilywhites to four points and a scoring difference of -16.

Kerry would then also need Mayo to lose both their two games (and Donegal to win their last two game) by a big enough aggregate score so that Mayo’s scoring difference would go below -15 and Kerry would survive that three-way tie. Or Kerry would need Donegal to beat Monaghan to but lose to Mayo to again force a three-way tie between Kerry, Donegal and Kildare on four points each, but have Donegal’s scoring difference also drop below -15 to ensure Kerry survived with a superior scoring difference.

The odds of Kerry surviving the drop on four points are so tiny that the reality is that they do, for all intents and purposes, need one more point from their last two games.

Though Kerry have a reasonable League record against Tyrone in Omagh they won’t want to be going there on the final Sunday needing a result. Therefore this Saturday’s game against Kildare is the ideal opportunity to get in, get a win and secure Division One status with a game in hand.

At least that way Kerry can ease a few more returning players into competitive action without the pressure of needing to beat Tyrone in the final round.