Five things we learned...

Take your points and the goals will come

KERRY’S goal drought over much of the League and into the last game against Clare was well documented - over 470 minutes without a goal since early Mayo, but the three they scored last Saturday night has put to bed any worries that it was anything more than a blip. Stephen O’Brien scored a classic turn-run-and-shoot goal while Paul Geaney showed all his predatory skills to mine two close-range goals. Crisis over.

White bringing club form to county team

ANYONE who saw Gavin White in action for Dr Crokes throughout 2017 knew he had the potential to make it as a Kerry senior, and now after just two games in the county colours he is already living up to that promise. His trademark runs out of defence were a hallmark for Crokes last season and on Saturday evening in Pairc Ui Chaoimh he was at it again: breaking from the half back line and killing the opposition with those penetrative solo runs.

40,000 Munster Final crowds are gone

WE documented last week that the average attendance for the last six Munster Football Finals was 29,772 and last Saturday’s crowd of 27,674 was a couple of thousand short of that mark. It doesn’t seem that long ago since the were crowds in excess of 40,000 packing themselves into Fitzgerald Stadium and the old Pairc Ui Chaoimh but it would appear that a return to those type of numbers is a long way off - especially if the lack of competitiveness in the province continues.

Cork football really is in a low, dark place

THEIR semi-final win over Tipperary offered a glimmer of hope to the optimists that some sort of meaningful renaissance was occurring in Cork football but Saturday’s 17-point drubbing by Kerry has set football in the Rebel county as far back as it ever was. The team has been stuck in Division 2 for the last two seasons and have made no impression on the Championship since 2010 when they were All-Ireland champions. Whether it’s down to a lack of natural talent, or proper coaching, or poor underage and/or club structures, or a collective lack of ambition, is anyone’s guess, but Cork football is at a very low ebb, which should concern everyone in the GAA and not just in the county itself

Direct route to Super 8s really did matter

EAMONN Fitzmaurice reaffirmed on Saturday night his pre-match belief that it would be important to win the Musnter title and go straight to the All-Ireland Quarter-final Group Stage (Super 8s) rather than facing a Round 4 Qualifier in a fortnight. Monday morning’s Round 3 Qualifier draw backed that up by keeping Mayo, Tyrone and Monaghan apart, meaning the likelihood that the beaten provincial finalists will be in the other pot to these three (and Clare or Armagh). On the basis of Saturday’s performance Kerry would fear none of those, but had they somehow lost to Cork they would have wanted the rebound game to be against one of those three. It’s all elementary now, of course, but as Munster champions they now have three weeks to plan for their next game, which they already know will be against Galway in Croke Park.