Hanging from the rafters

New look Stack Park sold out for Dublin’s visit

THE sold-out signs are up two weeks before the Kingdom prepare to welcome the reigning All Ireland and National League Champions, Dublin, to Austin Stack Park in the third round of this year’s National League.

A crowd of 12,000 is expected in the Boherbue venue for the clash with the metropolitians. Given that almost 13,000 people turned out to see the Kingdom’s opening round fixture with Tyrone in Fitzgerald Stadium it hardly comes as a surprise that the game is a sell-out.

The game will see the official debut of the new ‘shed end’ as the old John Mitchels’ terrace is sure to become known now that a new cantilever roof has been added under the direction of the Austin Stack Park development committee.

Kerry, meanwhile, will hope to continue their strong start to the league when they travel to Breffni Park on Sunday afternoon to take on Cavan (throw-in 2pm).

New Kerry boss Peter Keane is expected to have largely the same panel of players at his disposal and, while David Moran has returned to the country following his honeymoon, the Strand Road man looks unlikely to feature.

“I think he’s back on Monday,” Keane said.

“But we don’t know about that. We’d be hopeful James [O’Donoghue] would be okay, just a bit of a knock and we might get one or two others back and fellas looking out and they’re carrying bits of niggles and they’re looking at the lads and the lads did reasonably well and they’re there then going ‘I need to get my backside in here or some other fella will have me off my spot’.”

Chairman of the Austin Stack Park Committee, Tony O’Keeffe, in front of the new covered terracing at the old John Mitchels’ end of Austin Stack Park last week. The venue now has a capacity of 12,000.Photo by Domnick Walsh