That old familiar feeling

BACK in 2003, I took the Limerick team I then managed to Killarney for a Munster final replay, the last time the two teams met in Munster championship football at the venue.

I had invested heavily in instilling belief in my team with regard to their ability to beat Kerry and at various stages of both games the players looked like repaying that investment, but ultimately their belief, courage and no little ability weren’t enough to get the job done.

Before yesterday’s game I felt that Limerick would win the middle third with no Darragh O Sé or Paul Galvin to contend with, but the extent of their dominance in the first half was almost complete, with both John Galvin, in particular, and Jim Donovan fielding ball over their direct opponents heads on more than one occasion and their team winning nine out of 12 Kerry kick-outs, with four of those clean catches.