The Kerryman (South Kerry Edition)
Kingdom break cover in the race for Sam
Darran O’Sullivan’s return to form was the biggest story to emerge from the Kingdom’s hammering of Kildare, writes Damian Stack
THREE minutes, that’s all it took. That’s all it took for him to make an impact. It was pretty much his first touch of the ball too. He got it and turned, making a dart right at the heart of the Kildare defence. Such was the acceleration they never stood a chance of catching him, such was the speed they barely got the chance to lay a glove on him.
He bore down on goal, a couple of defenders to his left, Colm Cooper to his right, with full-back Mick O’Grady struggling to get back into position. The goal was his for the taking, instead he opted to lay it off to Cooper.
Arguably he was better positioned than Cooper to score, the decision to lay it off a demonstration of his unselfishness, a message to the manager that he’s a team player, a guy willing to do what it takes for the team, for the group.
What’s good for the group is good for the player. What’s good for Kerry is good for Darran O’Sullivan. Mere minutes after helping Cooper to his first Croke Park goal in a couple of seasons, the favour was returned and then some.
Cooper picked him out with a sweet pass, taking advantage of a brilliant run by the Glenbeigh man. It was textbook stuff, straight from the training ground, indicative of a bond between these players, demonstrative of an almost unfathomable level of understanding between two players not selected to start the game.
Perhaps it’s not all that unfathomable, but simply the proof of the pudding of what Eamonn Fitzmaurice and co are doing behind closed gates in Fitzgerald Stadium. Understanding like that doesn’t just happen, it takes time.
It’s in the crucible of those A versus B games that such moves are born. If those games weren’t as competitive as they self evidently are then there’s just no way O’Sullivan – or, for that matter, Cooper – could have been as sharp as he was.
Primed and ready to go, it must have been frustrating for O’Sullivan to sit on the bench for every championship game to date. It must have been doubly frustrating for him to sit on the bench for the entirety of the Munster final replay.
He would have felt – with very valid reasoning – that he had something to contribute and he would also have known just how fit he is. His injury troubles are long behind him.
Of course he has to be careful, of course he has to “prehab” as Eamonn Fitzmaurice put it post match, but even so he knew that he was ready.
Fitzmaurice knew it too. At some stage in the build up to the game Fitzmaurice called him to one side and let it be known that he was going to get his chance to cut loose on the hallowed turf early on Sunday afternoon.
When the call came just six minutes into the second half he was fully prepared for it, mentally as much as anything else. He was in the right head-space to make an impact straight away and make an impact he did.
Fitzmaurice’s word in the ear,
his vote of confidence in a player pushing hard for a place in the starting fifteen, was delivered at just the right time to deliver the best possible outcome. Further proof – if proof were needed – that the Finuge man knows what he’s doing.
Well before David Coldrick threw in the ball Fitzmaurice suspected this was going to be a good weekend for his team. No, he didn’t anticipate a massacre such as what we got, he just got the sense that all was right with the world.
As soon as the team gathered on Saturday morning in advance of the trip to the capital he noticed the focus of his players. They were tuned in, they were focussed and, most importantly of all, they were relaxed. It’s a hard balancing act, that between focus and relaxation. Too much of either could spell disaster.
This weekend Kerry found the sweet-spot and did so in more ways than one. The Kingdom were awesome and awe inspiring. Kildare were left for dead, left chasing their tails, left licking their wounds.
The gulf in class, in attitude, in application between the two sides could not have been starker. Kerry worked like dogs, dictated the tone and the tempo. The Lilywhites by contrast were far, far too accommodating.
For all the praise being heaped on Kerry right now that needs to be borne in mind more than nearly anything else. Kildare didn’t so much rage against the dying of the light as fatalistically await its cold embrace.
Of all the damning statistics (from Kildare’s perspective) to emerge from this fixture the fact that not a single yellow card was flashed over the seventy minutes is, perhaps, the most worrying of all.
Where was the intensity in the tackle, the over zealousness so often evident in the desire to win the ball at any cost? Where was the cranky truculence? Where was the guy hitting his man with a late tackle, knowing a card would result, determined to make a statement nevertheless?
Want proof that nice guys finish last? Then this was it.
It’s not as though Kildare lack for quality footballers. They scored three points in the first half and they were all of the highest order and that was kinda their problem. They were having to go full-on Roy of the Rovers on it from an early stage. They lacked a structure, a system, to deliver routine scores and routine chances.
Then, when Kerry turned on the style in the second half, they simply collapsed under the strain and, once they did, it was truly lamentable stuff. None of which is Kerry’s problem: time to trot out the old cliché about beating what’s in front of you.
Kerry defended like tigers, cleaned out yet another highly-rated midfield and scored for fun down the other end. Other than that what’s there to say? Job done, move along, nothing more to see here folks.
It’s Tyrone or Monaghan up next and with three weeks to prepare for that game Kerry are sitting pretty.
Plus ça change.
Where was the cranky truculence? Where was the guy hitting his man with a late tackle?