Kerry still has one champion
Ireland’s first Australian Football League Premiership medal winner, Tadhg Kennelly, is determined to fly the Premiership Trophy back to his home town of Listowel and lessen some of the upset of yesterday’s loss at Croke Park.
Kennelly, who received calls and texts of well-wishes from members of the Kerry squad ahead of Saturday’s historic win by the Sydney Swans over West Coast, watched the game in Sydney with his All-Ireland winning father Tim and mother Nuala last night.
Though disappointed by the result, young Kennelly plans to return to Ireland in the next fortnight and wants the cup to follow him.
“I’ll definitely try to get it home in the next two months. Whether I achieve it or not, I don’t know. It’s a long way to go with it, but I’ll try,” he said.
In Australia, the media love affair with Kennelly continues to grow.
“It was all there again yesterday - the presence of mind across half-back as the Eagles streamed forward, the strength and timing in the air, the exhilarating pace that has given Sydney such drive out of defence, the daring ball-carrying and the aggressive run forward that brought him a grand final goal in the second quarter. It sent the Swans surging ahead, lifted a large part of 91,000 people out of their seats,” is how the Melbourne Age described his impact.
Kennelly downplayed his performance in his 101st outing for the club.
“Look, you don’t really think about it at the time, you just kick a goal. That’s all it is, really,” he said afterwards.
“I approached the game as though it was just like any other game because if you start thinking about the result and winning a premiership or losing a premiership and the consequences, that’s when you get caught up and make the mistakes and are not having a crack,” he said.
“It’s just another game at the end of the day and it happened to be a grand final. Not much else changes. The pressure steps up a bit.”
A bit? Well, perhaps more than a bit, Kennelly conceded.
“I was blowing a bit early. The first 10 minutes, I don’t think I’ve ever played anything like it in my life. It was really unbelievable,” he said.
“I don’t think it’s the pace of the game. It’s more the tension, the build-up, the week, to walk inside the dressing room, then waiting, waiting, waiting, waiting.
“I was like, ‘Gee, when are we going to get on the ground here?’ Then you get out there and there’s the tension and you just go at a 100 miles an hour. Then after five or 10 minutes, you’re just blowing like nothing. I’m thinking, ‘Geez this is hard, this is hard. Come on, where’s my second wind? Is it coming?’
“Then it kicks in about 10 or 15 minutes in the first quarter.”
Kennelly’s teammates carried the tension borne of 72 years of disappointment; he carried the added weight of a nation. Typically, he bore it lightly.
“There was a lot of expectation but, look, the people at home were great to me,” he said.
“The ringing was constant, you know. I turned on my phone this morning and there were 35 messages from last night. If I didn’t turn it off, I would have been awake all night. It was quite unbelievable.”
As to the future Kennelly stresses he is likely to return to chase All-Ireland glory when his Sydney contract expires at the end of next season.
“I’ll hopefully get back there and win that,” he said. “This makes up for it a small bit, but it’s still something missing in my life.”
Something that can bring a smile to some sad Kerry faces today.
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