All ready for a Royal appointment

THERE were 81,890 people packed into Croke Park three weeks ago to watch Kerry’s breathtaking All-Ireland quarter-final demolition of Dublin and like every other spectator, Eamonn O’Brien departed awestruck at what he had just observed.

Six days later, O’Brien supervised his Meath players clipping the wings of Mayo and now he is primed with the task of figuring out a method to stop Kerry in next Sunday’s All-Ireland SFC semi-final. Kerry’s football touched perfection against Dublin and O’Brien admits that if they tap into that form again, then his team are in trouble.

“I was at the Dublin game and the football was almost perfect. If that Kerry team turns up, we won’t live with them. It was near perfection – in terms of execution of passes, in terms of movement off the ball, speed, creating scores and taking chances. I would have expected Dublin to battle harder. Having said that, I don’t think anyone would have lived with Kerry and the performance they produced.”