The Kerryman (South Kerry Edition)
‘They were willing to just go for it and have a cut’
Peter Keane gets where the fans are coming from because he is a football supporter himself, writes Damian Stack
THE thing is, he gets it. Gets how you’re thinking. Gets how you’re feeling. Gets what it’s like to pile into a car of a hot summer’s day, sun high in the sky, windows rolled down as you head off for some far-flung outpost of gaeldom to support the cause.
He’s been that soldier. He knows the rhythms of the GAA season from the fan’s perspective as well as anybody. The excitement, the hope, the dreams, the debates, the messing, the craic of it all and, probably, that’s the single most important part of it.
It has to be fun. Otherwise what’s the point? Yes, we take it seriously and, yes, he takes it seriously – scrupulously so – but the reason we do is because we love it, and we love it because it’s fun. We love it because of how it makes us feel.
The thrill of seeing something we’ve never seen before. The thrill of seeing something we barely thought possible, those little moments of genius from a Colm Cooper or a Maurice Fitzgerald that instantly bring a smile to your face.
The fun we have talking about it after, reminiscing and exaggerating. In these socially distant times it’s that which we miss as much – if not more – than the on-field action. Football is, has been, and always will be about people and how we express ourselves to the wider world and to each other.
After eighteen months or so in the hot seat, that’s the thing Peter Keane points to as the best part of the job. The sheer fun of it and, honestly, that’s a refreshing thing to hear. Often – too often – we can be quite po-faced when talking about sport and football. “It’s the fun,” he says.
“It’s the fun that you have. Whether it’s training or whether it’s on the bus or whatever, it’s the fun. It’s enjoyable. Look, everyone wants to play and if you can’t play this is the next best thing. When you’re involved with the lads, the players and the wider group of people, the management, all the back-room team, there’s great fun in it.”
Keane is well-aware of the privileged position he finds himself in. He gets that he’s living a lot of people’s dreams, including, obviously, his own. He gets that the view from the inside looking out is a lot different to the view from the outside looking in.
“It different,” the Cahersiveen man admits.
“It was definitely different, because at the end of the day if I wasn’t involved with this I would be in the car with the wife and three kids and we having our own perspective on it and picking teams and talking about the games on the way home.
“We’re all into it – every fella in Kerry. Every man, every woman, every supporter – they’re all into it. You’re just maybe looking at it slightly differently because there’s things that you know that they don’t know and there might be reasons that I can’t verbalise to people, but that’s just the nature of it.”
That ability to see both sides has stood well to Keane during his tenure to date. The public-facing nature of his job as the owner of a large supermarket in Killorglin means he has his ear closer to the ground than a lot of inter-county managers.
“I’m in the public eye all the time with the SuperValu and I suppose I’m available. Well maybe available isn’t the right word, but I’m in the eye all the time. I think people love the banter about the game and, look, I don’t mind that,” he says.
Maybe because of that, maybe because of the age profile of the side or maybe just because of their accelerated development and the style of football they play, a real bond seemed to develop between this Kerry football team and the fans. Something that was patently obvious to us by the time Championship rolled around last summer.
“I actually sensed it much earlier,” Keane says.
“We sensed it maybe in the League. When you take, say, our first game last year when we had Tyrone and how vocal the crowd were behind us that day. Then we went up to Cavan and it was a right long journey and we struggled a bit in that game and the crowd really came behind us in the second half of that game. And then we had the night below in Tralee [against Dublin] and the place was a crescendo that night.
“I would have felt that they really rowed in behind us and I think they probably would have liked the style of football that the lads were trying to play. And I think, look, they were young and they were new and a lot of them were new to the general public through minor success over the years and they wanted to back these fellas.”
Although, sometimes we might wonder how much of what’s going on in the outside world filters into the camp, Keane is clear that it formed a positive feed-back loop for management and players alike.
“Oh yeah absolutely it does, and I know you might like to try and isolate things and this word bubble is used a lot, but fellas do, they understand that and no different to what we said earlier on about being a supporter,” he explains.
“Sure the lads are going home to their homes, which is in the middle of a parish or the middle of a club, and you’re amongst your own and they’re hearing about what’s going on from their own team mates who they’re playing club football with or who they’ve grown up with or who they went to school with. They’re very aware, very cognisant of all that.”
When Keane stepped up from the minor gig to the senior job, you’d be tempted to think it was a whole new ball game. For the man himself, however, it goes back to that same truism we already mentioned: football, first and foremost, is about people.
“I suppose it was just getting a handle on the players really from the initial start of it,” he says.
“While I would have known a good share of them over the years, whether it’s at club or minor level, you’re still going into the dressing room with them and getting to know them. Getting to know them a bit better and equally them getting to know me and know the other guys around.
“The backroom team was all pretty new at the time to them as well. It was just a new kind of relationship, getting to know fellas, you know?”
Still though, the pace with which the new-look Kingdom got up to speed surprised a lot of people. We went from talking
about the team’s potential to watching it compete for silverware within a few months of Keane assuming the reins.
The accelerated development curve didn’t really surprise Keane – “Was I shocked we were in the final at the end of it? No I wasn’t” – and he can point to reasons for why such a young side was able to play to a high standard in such a short space of time.
“I think there’s probably two sides of that,” he explains.
“Number one, because of the age profile of the team they were willing to just go for it and have a cut at it. And number two, the standard of the football was probably quite similar to what these fellas are used to playing all the time and they just went at it, and the style of football the same.”
Looking back to how the season ended up – beaten by arguably the greatest team of all time in a replay – has to be encouraging for the future of this Kerry side.
“Yeah, but sure when you’re saying encouraging for the future, the reality is you’re back at the bottom of the greasy pole again now and you have to try climb it now again,” Keane counters.
“Whatever went on last year now is history, you’re starting all over again now. It was great to get there, obviously disappointing to not get over the line, on either the first or the second day, but obviously you’re starting out from the bottom again whenever we do start!”
You wonder which day was most disappointing: the day the dream died (the replay) or the day the title slipped from the Kingdom’s grasp in injury time (the drawn game).
“You probably can’t analyse that at the time because you’ve to tune in straight away after the first day,” he says.
“You’re going up to Dublin and you’re planning to be finished that Sunday evening with the team or whatever, and you’re thinking about what’s going to happen thereafter. You’re going there thinking you’re going to win and this, that and the other. You don’t have time to thinking about the disappointment of that day because look you’ve got to come out of that dressing room preparing for thirteen days later.
“Any day you don’t win you’re going to be a bit disappointed, but I don’t think we’d any fear going in for the first day either. I think we went in the first day believing we were going to win the game. I know that sounds like a cliché after a while, but the fact is we went in that first day believing that we were going to win the All-Ireland.”
The 2020 season to date has been a little patchy at times, but with three wins, one draw and one defeat, the Kingdom were safe from the drop and on the cusp of returning to the National League final.
“We’re happy with where we’re at,” Keane says.
“Obviously we started a bit later this year than we had last year because of two things. One: we ran a bit later. We ran into the middle of September and then lads went into the County Championship and their district board championships and stuff, and then [in 2018] the Championship was over in the first week in August so they were ready to go much earlier and as a new management we wanted to get in there early and get cracking.
“Two: we went at it later this year and there was a team holiday and stuff like that. We were starting to get to the point of where we were managing to bring things together.”
Of course, the back-room team was shaken up a little with the departure of Donie Buckley just days before the shut-down – Keane declined to comment on his departure – and there was a bit of concern about how Kerry were defending. Keane, however, seems very comfortable in his own skin and comfortable with the way things are going or at least with the way things were going.
None of us know when everything will be back up and running again, but we can be certain that the fans’ man on the inside will be well set up for it.
I would have felt that they really rowed in behind us and I think they probably would have liked the style of football the lads were trying to play