Kerry…0-20
Galway…0-16
If you’ve been frequenting this space for long enough, it will surely have cropped up in your perusals that musical tastes in this seat are many and varied. To put it very mildly. From The Dubliners to Elvis Presley, Johnny Cash to The Irish Tenors, you wouldn’t just know what would rock up on a Spotify play list.
In the last couple of days, when contemplating Kerry’s latest ascent to the mountain top, two tracks in particular have been to the forefront of thoughts. One perhaps obvious, Sean Dunphy’s beautiful rendition of the Rose Of Tralee. The other maybe less so – Luke Kelly’s solo performance of The Rising Of The Moon.
There was another lunar-related entry on said amalgam, Bad Moon Rising, which was listened to so much one eventually got sick of it and deleted it. However, if Credence Clearwater Revival were ever tempted to hit a recording studio again, they could do far worse than churn something out about a green moon rising.
To many, and probably nobody more so than themselves, the most recent coronation in The Kingdom has been a long time coming. It says a lot about the psyche down that way that they consider eight years without an All Ireland title a famine. What must the long suffering folk in Mayo think when they hear such wild and whirling words?
Against that though, there would surely have been a realisation that, having won the All Ireland MFC for a handful of years on the trot that there was an avalanche of young talent germinating on the banks of the River Maine.
Mind you, on that very point, it says much about the depth of talent at Jack O’Connor’s disposal that Stefan Okunbor never got a look in for the entire season having returned from a spell in the Australian Football League. You’d hope the utility player will get his chance to prove his worth in the near future. It would be a shame if his talents weren’t utilised having returned home. Moreover, in light of recent developments closer to home, you’d hope attempts would at least be made to get our exports home.
There is, however, the sense that the most significant change in Kerry’s setup has been the return of O’Connor himself to the dugout. As somebody who was also in the news this week said in the build up to the final, Jack was given one mission statement at the beginning of his third coming – bring Sam home!
Now, it’s absolutely no reflection on those who managed Kerry before the Dromod man returned, but, the team that Jack built sailed through the season until they found themselves back in GAA HQ.
Their semi final against Dublin will, in the fullness of time, go down as one of the great exhibitions of our native game. It may also be the game which launches the restoration of an empire. In Kerry’s own minds, you suspect they wouldn’t have felt like the complete package until they had laid what had become the bogey of their arch nemeses. Then again, there will most likely have been a realisation that Galway represented a clear and present danger to their domination ambitions.
There were those who sought to pigeon hole the contest as a straight shootout between David Clifford and Shane Walsh. Any such summation would of course by easy to understand and concur with. However, that would do an unjust disservice to players such as Sean Kelly, Liam Silke, John Daly, Cillian McDaid, Patrick Kelly, Rob Finnerty and Damien Comer on one side, and Shane Murphy, Jason Foley, Tom O’Sullivan, Gavin White, Sean O’Shea, Stephen O’Brien and Paudie Clifford on the other.
For all that, it was indeed the two most highly vaunted players on the field who dominated the opening stanza. At the end of which the men from the west held a one point advantage, 0-08 to 0-07. In reality they were value for considerably more of a cushion than that.
Mind you, in the opposing corner, there is likely to have been a quiet satisfaction in the knowledge that they hadn’t got out of first gear and were still only one in arrears as the Jaffa Cakes were doing the rounds. Furthermore, it can also be fairly safely assumed the Kerry players had their ears the colour of a Cork jersey by the time they returned for the second half.
Because collectively it was blatantly obvious that those in the green and gold seriously upped their output following the change of ends. With the result that they managed to nullify the impact of Padraic Joyce’s side for long spells of the second half.
As a result of which the Munster team were able to build up quite the buffer for themselves. Inspired by the electric Graham O’Sullivan in defence, a mamoth effort from Diarmuid O’Connor at midfield and David Clifford resembling perfection in human form.
In the humble opinion of this neutral observer, it was in fact the influence of Diarmuid O’Connor which ultimately sent Sam back to his most familiar holiday destination. Not just on final day either.
Though it did become more obvious when Paul Conroy was withdrawn entering the final quarter, the Na Gaeil player had been steadily increasing as Kerry’s ultimately glorious odyssey progressed.
When it came to going down the home straight, while David Clifford delivered one of the greatest individual displays ever seen on the old field, it was only the commensurate contributions of the two O’Sullivans in the full back line, Gavin White, O’Connor and the introduced Spillane brothers, Adrian and Killian, which hauled the mission over the line to completion.
I say hauled because those fuelled by tasty and tempting food refused to go away and, in the end, it took a highly contentious free – awarded to the latter Spillane – and a fine individual score by the same player sated the famine hunger.
The contentious free coming about when it appeared the Kerry player had in fact pulled John Daly down onto himself rather than the Galway player commiting any indisgression. A tough call against the Tribesmen, absolutely, but to pinpoint it as the sole reason Sam went south would be stretching it.
So, Kerry’s promise has finally come to fruition. The sense now is that the Gaelic football world is now their oyster. On the other side, while there will naturally be disappointment in the home of the Joyce Country Ceili Band, the gut feeling that they remain a coming force hasn’t changed.
The latter sentiment can also be applied to maybe a handful of other counties, at a push. Outside of that, there are plenty with plenty of catching up to do.
Leave a Reply