GIANT STRIDES
Kerry and Donegal have the height to stand tall against all rivals, but need brains to ensure that size truly matters
MIDFIELDERS SHOULD NOT BE REDUCED TO BEING BALL
MAGNETS
THE only shadow Dublin football has to live under is the one that will be cast in Tralee today by the game’s two biggest teams. Donegal travel to Austin Stack Park to take on Kerry and if that fixture has lost its hook from 12 months ago, when it served as an AllIreland final rematch, it should not be caught short for a selling point.
Perhaps the tag for today’s game should read ‘no country for small men’ given that between the two panels, a full team of natural, old fashioned, raw-boned midfielders could be constructed.
That is not just because there are 15 men who are north of 6ft, but all have played the specialised role at midfield with club and county.
And in the main they still do. They won’t all be there today – injuries keeping a number, most notably Kerry’s established partnership of Anthony Maher and David Moran, away but when all are fit and well, these two teams boast the kind of midfield depth that others could drown in.
And the prospect of a mark – it could be in play for the start of the Championship if Central Council give the green light to its introduction at this month’s meeting – should play into the hands of teams staffed with manmountains.
That, however, is being slightly simplistic.
Kerry’s one rock of supposed certainty was that the Moran-Maher axis would dominate on long restarts in the All-Ireland final last September, but Dublin managed to turn over more ball – eight to seven – and their rookie Bryan Fenton ended up as man of the match.
Donegal only have to point to last weekend’s League clash against Mayo as proof that size counts for little on its own.
The Connacht champions squeezed them tight in the first half and forced goalkeeper Peter Boyle to put the ball in flight, losing seven of their own kick-outs in a row and, in total, lost 12 out of 15 contested restarts.
That is some statistic given that Donegal had Michael Murphy and Rory Kavanagh in the centre from the outset and Odhrán MacNiallais close by for assistance.
Before the day was out, they were joined by Neil Gallagher (albeit for a single play during which he picked up a black card), Christy Toye, Martin McElhinney and Leo McLoone from the bench.
And yet, they posted the kind of numbers that suggested they were not a team with a head for heights. For all their size, Donegal were quick to cotton on that there is a lot more to the primary possession winning game these days.
That is why Paul Durcan trans- formed himself into one of the most skilled restarters in the game – those sliced deliveries pitched to meet the runs to the wing were a key part in their game-plan – and his absence is so sorely felt that Rory Gallagher’s ambition is to lure him away from Dubai’s sunshine for a few months this summer.
Kerry are no different; for all the natural talent in the hands of Moran and Maher, it is their movement that makes them such potent and visible targets.
To reduce midfielders to being ball magnets from set-plays is to completely miss the point.
Donegal have realised that better than anyone else.
Last year, they carried seven natural midfielders – Gallagher, MacElhinney, Murphy, Toye, McNiallais and Hugh McFadden were supplemented by the return in late summer of McLoone – and played all of them regularly.
With the return of Kavanagh and the emergence of the highly-rated Ciarán Thompson that number has swelled further, yet deployment will not be an issue, whether it is starting or coming from the bench.
Given their embarrassment of riches, it jars with reason that they should seek to borrow Murphy from a full-forward line that is left to lean heavily on Paddy McBrearty, but it is in keeping with the fluidity which is their defining characteristic.
Murphy is so gifted that his impact on the team from deep supercedes his threat from close to goal, but he is just one moving part.
MacNiallais has spent more time as a half-forward than a midfielder and wields his left-foot with such effect that he can sting for scores, but that won’t stop him dropping deeper to hunt ball.
Kavanagh has always been half wing-forward/ half conventional midfielder and he has the athleticism and presence to do both.
The refusal to pigeonhole players extends to even their mainstay in the middle Neil Gallagher, who Jim McGuinness doubted would have the speed of mind and body to fit into his game plan when he took over in 2011.
And yet, three years later he invested such faith in him that he played him effectively as a centreforward in their 2014 All-Ireland semi-final win over Dublin.
What sets Donegal apart from the rest, not least Kerry, is how comfortably their big men have become key men in different lines.
While Éamonn Fitzmaurice’s ruthlessness when it comes to form has ensured that there are no untouchables – a point that he has proved in dropping both David Moran (2014) and Maher (last year) when both went on and had All-Star seasons – the Kerry midfield sector has not been exposed to the same state of flux.
But then the options don’t run as deep either in terms of challenging the incumbents or in deploying their big men comfortably in different roles.
Kieran Donaghy started last weekend in the middle alongside his successor as Kerry captain Bryan Sheehan, but his lack of mobility means that his role this season will be limited to where he has shown his greatest menace at full-forward.
The hype attached to Tommy Walsh’s return was hard for the 26year-old to live up to, but there is little evidence that he can resume the threads of the half-forward posting he served in 2009, prior to his departure to the AFL, and he is battling to be a reserve option at midfield and full-forward.
Johnny Buckley has been deployed as a half-forward with strong ball winning functions in set-plays, while Sheehan, despite his sublime ballstriking ability, had to settle for the bench for much of last year.
His status as captain, and his form this winter with St Mary’s and South Kerry, should mean that he will push hard this summer, but pace issues will mean that he and Buckley are unlikely to be considered in the same line.
That is even more likely to be the case should Fitzmaurice seek to use Colm Cooper as his quarter-back in the half-forward line this summer, which would accentuate the need to have fast legs on call close by.
Both these teams might be blessed with size but it has been an easier fit for Donegal.