‘Ultimately our aim is to try and get to a league final and right the wrongs of last year’

Kerry boss Fintan O’Connor has brought a welcome period of stability to Kerry hurling

IT’S been an interesting couple of years for Fintan O’Connor as Kerry boss. Initially picking up the pieces after Ciarán Carey’s December departure was challenging to say the least. In the meantime there have been highs, there have been lows, more than anything else though it’s been a fairly steady period for Kerry hurling. O’Connor has brought a much needed air of calm and stability to the entire set-up.

This year is his fourth in charge – starting in 2017 – making him one of the longest serving Kerry hurling managers of the past twenty years. Only John Meyler, who took the Kingdom for three years at the start of the last decade, comes close for consecutive seasons in charge of late.

Having that sort of stability is good as Kerry seek to return to the top table of the National Hurling league. O’Connor isn’t learning on the job now as he was when he first took on the role, now he’s got his feet firmly under the table, now he knows the lie of the land.

The knowledge O’Connor has accumulated over the past three years will prove invaluable this year in particular as he seeks to build on the more promising aspects of last season and push Kerry onto the next level.

The Kildare native and Tipperary resident knows the depth of talent coming through the ranks in the Kingdom having been heavily involved for the past three years with the Kerry Under 21 and 20 teams that claimed three All Ireland titles back-to-back at B level.

Looking back to last season probably the biggest source of regret was the failure to beat Westmeath in the Division 2A final in a wet and windy Cusack Park. Westmeath were the better team on the day on balance, but Kerry were pretty damned close. It wouldn’t have taken much to turn the tide there.

“We would have hoped to get out of 2A and get up and that’s, I suppose, why I was disappointed ultimately,” O’Connor says.

“Losing the league final we didn’t cope with them [conditions] as well as Westmeath did, the use of the breeze, we were very disappointed with the way we played really after having fairly good performances throughout all of the league.

“We didn’t really perform at all in the final, so, we were very disappointed, but that’s not taking from the way Westmeath played the day of the final. The Joe McDonagh is a very tough competition and I suppose every team in it probably have an aim of winning it, but, that said every team in it can end up being in a relegation match and that’s where it turned out for us.

“It was massive [the win over Offaly in the final round], because, if we didn’t win, we were looking down the barrel of Christy Ring hurling, and that’s, with the greatest respect to those teams playing Christy Ring [not] where we want to be.

“Laois beat us at home [and] probably on reflection they were the best team in the Joe McDonagh by a nice distance and that’s where you like to get, they are probably the benchmark.”

To get to that level the Kingdom are going to have to put in one hell of a shift this year, but O’Connor is clear that a balance has to be struck, particularly in pre-season.

“At Christmas time you try and get the balance right between getting the best out of them,” he says.

“The amount of lads opting out of hurling and football all across the country, you don’t want them to opt out because of you. So, you are trying to strike a balance between not being too hard on them and not being too easy on them.

“And that’s something I suppose I am trying to do, but I am kind of learning all of the time.”

One of the biggest issues O’Connor faced last year and will face again this year is the April club football month. That coupled with third level competition at the start of the National League campaign makes things that bit trickier, even if there are tangible benefits to having guys lining out at that elite level.

“Shane [Conway] got huge personal benefit,” O’Connor says.

“And I think he learned an awful lot from the lads he was playing with in UCC and I think he brought an awful lot back here to the group from a leadership point of view. I look around the programmes last weekend and

I see ten, twelve

Westmeath fellows, twelve

Carlow lads and a whole load of Offaly lads on teams all over the country and that’s where we have to get to.

“We need a base of young fellows experiencing that type of hurling as well. Laois didn’t play any round of championship in April, which gives them a fair bit of an advantage on us anyway. I don’t think there was as many rounds in other places either.

“No matter what I say about it it’s going to be the same this April and we will just have to cope with it as best we can.”

Increasingly there’s a feeling that as far as developing counties like Kerry are concerned the league is where it’s at, the league is where you have to stake a claim. The McDonagh Cup is a fine competition, but to progress Kerry will need to be playing at the top table in the early months of the year.

That makes winning this competition probably the number 1 target for O’Connor and co this year, but it won’t be easy as the Kerry boss explains.

“I think they [Offaly] will be a huge factor in the league, an awful lot of talent, I see they beat Antrim by a point last weekend. I know last year we were lucky to beat them in Tralee [and] I am sure Michael Duignan, and Michael Fennelly will want that [promotion] for Offaly hurling, but they don’t want it anymore than Ger McCarthy, Paudie Dineen myself and the players want it for Kerry hurling.

“Really it’s a very difficult place to go [Trim] and we went up there a couple of years ago in the round robin in Leinster and they [Meath] turned us over fairly well. Wicklow have just been promoted and will be playing in the Christy Ring, it’s tough logistically [Aughrim].

“It’s fairly taxing on the group to travel two weeks in-a-row and I know we will be playing Wicklow after a week off so hopefully, that will come into account. Look, it’s nice to have a home game against Antrim.

“We have to go back up there for the championship, which is the third year ina-row, which is unbelievable I suppose, but I am told it’s believable and get on with it, so that’s what we have to do.

“Ultimately our aim is to try and get to a league final and right the wrongs of last year.”