Tradition only takes you so far
In 2004 expectations were dampened by Kerry’s troubles in overcoming a cussed Limerick challenge in Munster, while in 2006 and 2009 O’Connor was forced to navigate the rocky road to Dublin via the qualifiers.
2006 saw one of the low points in the county’s proud footballing history when Declan O’ Sullivan left the field in Páirc Uí Chaoimh to an unseemly chorus of boos from a smattering of his own supporters apparently intent on proving that Páidí Ó Sé didn’t go far enough in his infamous assessment of the essential nature of the Kerry fan four years earlier.
While the reaction to a listless first outing against Tipperary and an injury to a marquee midfielder hardly bears comparison with the apocalyptic soundtrack that accompanied the travails of ‘06 or even ‘09, last week O’Connor noted “a few dramatic statements here and there” in the aftermath of their victory in Thurles.
The South Kerry man has heard it all before.
He has been around long enough to greet the near annual mutterings about the end of an empire with a wry smile and he knows that Kerry’s status in the game means that they are always one lacklustre performance or leaked ‘disciplinary issue’ away from a ‘crisis’.
There may, however, be a hint of truth to some of the less dramatic early season pronouncements on the state of Kerry football.
With the increased premium placed on possession in recent years this group of Kerry footballers seem to be playing at times in a manner that is at odds with their instincts.
The game has changed too much for any team to trust itself entirely to the joys of self-expression but in club football Crossmaglen have proven that there is a template for a type of football that values instinct as highly as work-rate.
It could be argued that the Crossmaglen model does not translate easily to the intercounty game but Kerry appear the be best equipped of all teams to test the notion. Kerry still retain more instinctive and naturally gifted footballers than any other team, but those players need to find something that they have lost along the way.
The poet calls that ‘something’ his muse, the rock star, his mojo. Whatever you call it, it can be notoriously difficult to rediscover once lost.
It has become a source of concern in Kerry that their county team appear in recent games to have stopped drawing from the well of traditional values that have proven so successful in the past. In recognising that the game has changed and will continue to change, Kerry appear to have adopted a passing game based on conservative and barren structures of obedience designed for teams of lesser talent such as the Fermanagh and Kildare teams of 2008, who gave us a bleak vision of the future four years ago with what one wise-guy described as “twenty-five long, scoreless minutes of tantric football followed by a stingy drizzle of scores”.
In a near 13 minute video piece on their recently revamped website (kerrygaa.ie) Kerry players and managers from past and present line up to tell us of the proud tradition the players of today and tomorrow are charged with upholding.
Later on in the piece, Mícheál Ó Muircheartaigh narrates some archive footage telling us that Kerry have from the times of Dick Fitzgerald and later Dr Eamonn O Sullivan, shaped the way the game has been played.
If these sentiments are to be authentic or are to hold any meaning at all, Kerry above all others need to be seen to be true to the basic principles of the game. In their last three competitive games Kerry’s starting half forwards have scored four points between them. Even allowing for all the innovations and modifications inherent in the possession based modern game, that return is not good enough.
That is not to say that the likes of Declan O’ Sullivan, Paul Galvin and Darran O Sullivan won’t rediscover their mojo in Páirc Uí Chaoimh tomorrow. To do so they need to rid themselves of the impoverished notion that their defensive duties should outweigh their attacking instincts.
The deep-lying playmaker brief has immobilised Paul Galvin to the extent that he’s now starting to doubt his ability to complete the most routine of kick-passes. Perhaps a return to the scene of his greatest ever showing in a Kerry jersey two years ago will help him reconnect with what it was made him a great footballer in the first place.
If Cork decide to go with their selected half back-line (which I seriously doubt they will) all three Kerry half forwards have the beating of their direct opponent. Paudie Kissane kicked three points from play in the drawn encounter in Killarney two seasons ago but Kerry will happily concede ground in the middle again if it means that Cork’s half backs are incited to shoot as opposed to allowing them supply the bullets for the real dangermen inside.
In order for Cork to win they are going to have to start making their match-ups work a whole lot better. Selecting Pearse O’Neill on the forty plays into Kerry’s hands as it allows them match him with Eoin Brosnan — the only player in their back-line with O’Neill’s physicality and pace. I doubt the Aghada man will play the game as an orthodox centre forward.
Training ground form, so often the measure of Jack O’Connor’s selection policies, sees Aidan O’Mahony replace Daniel Bohane and even prior to Bryan Sheehan’s unfortunate injury, Seamus Scanlon had been showing signs that he, along with Johnny Buckley as replacement might have the capacity to disrupt the workings in the Cork engine room.
There are those who believe Sheehan’s absence will ensure a more immediate supply to Donaghy and Cooper but his loss as a freetaker and playmaker are bound to be felt. Kerry’s best hope of not feeling Sheehan’s loss is that David Coldrick, the top referee by some distance in the game right now, will disregard the boys with the pencils and notebooks in the stands and manage the game without fuss.
Will Aidan Walsh start at midfield? Only those inside the Cork camp can answer that, but by placing O’Neill at midfield, Donncha O’Connor or Paul Kerrigan on the forty and Walsh inside at the edge of the square, Cork would become a lot less predictable.
Will Eoin Cadogan track Colm Cooper and are there already signs in Cooper’s championship form at both club (vs Crossmaglen’s James Morgan) and county (vs Tipp’s Ciarán McDonald) this year to suggest that Cadogan could become the third defender to subdue him this season? Will the Cork management pull a rabbit from the hat and start Ciarán Sheehan and Daniel Goulding and if so, who will be left out? On current evidence Kerry don’t yet look to be enough in tune with their instincts but with scoregetting still a random and guerrilla enterprise for a Cork team who haven’t beaten them in four championship games in three years, who do you trust most to close the deal?
So many questions, so many variables but the central irony of all Cork-Kerry games lies ultimately in the fact that no matter how closely you pay attention, no matter how carefully you follow the subtleties of the play, you are still likely to be fooled at the end. Cork to sneak it but no refunds if it goes the other way!
