Kerry audition for special reserves

THE weather’s making for crisp sunny days and clear nights, but don’t expect to see stars dancing across the Kerry skyline any time soon.

With the county’s All-Ireland winners toasting themselves and their September success in sunny Jamaica, the Kingdom’s A-listers are scarcely contemplating unfurling themselves from a winter slumber for the next month – or two.

But with that comes opportunity for a number of Kerry footballers in the McGrath Cup and the early stages of the National League. With the rate of postponements unlikely to abate this weekend, Kerry coach Jack O’Connor and his management team may even be back from vacation by the time the McGrath Cup game against IT Tralee is played, and they’ll have plenty of fodder to feast on ahead of the 2010 season.

With Tadhg Kennelly and Tommy Walsh in Australia, and the call of Father Time on Sean O’Sullivan likely to be followed shortly by possibly two more front-line retirements, Kerry have plenty of scope for experimentation this spring.

Just as they’d like it, in fact.

If recent history has taught anything about the All-Ireland football championship, it’s asking a lot to retain the necessary intensity on one level, and team chemistry on another, for back-to-back tilts at the championship. Chances are that even if every one of Kerry’s 30-man All-Ireland winning panel had remained on board, O’Connor and co would have been looking to shake things up a bit. Looking forward to sending out a few, clear messages even. Consequently, they are already looking at a spring warm weather training camp abroad to avoid any repeat of the alarming dip in form between last year’s National League success and the Munster Championship.

Kerry coach O’Connor has learned valuable lessons from his first spell in charge, and the necessity to keep things fresh is one of them.

Who knows how much longer Diarmuid Murphy and Darragh O Sé will continue to serve their county with distinction, but the Kerry selectors wouldn’t be paying due care and attention if they weren’t grooming replacements. Desmonds’ Ger Reidy was back-up goalkeeper to All Star Murphy last season, but he will come under pressure from Gaeltacht’s Tomás Mac an tSaoir. Kilcummin’s Brendan Kealy is another the management has an eye on.

Defensively, it’s presumed though not confirmed that Mike McCarthy will remain with Kerry for another season, and nobody’s denying it’s vital that he does. Tommy Griffin, Tom O’Sullivan and Tomás O Sé are the wrong side of 30 and despite remarkable consistency, will need to be protected to ensure they’re revved up for summer. That puts the spotlight firmly on Aidan O’Mahony, Padraig Reidy, Daniel Bohane and Aidan O’Shea to step it up a notch in 2010.

There’s no certainty that Darragh O Sé will call it a day before this year’s serious action begins, but it’s still asking a lot for him to get up to the necessary level of fitness to continue to be a front-line player. However his experience would be priceless on the training field and in the dressing room for those midfielders bidding to fill his big shoes.

Seamus Scanlon is looking to build on last year’s All Star campaign, and the likes of Mike Quirke, David Moran and Anthony Maher will be seeking to become his permanent midfield partner. Each has convincing arguments behind them – Quirke had his most effective campaign in the county’s colours, Moran has the Australian bug out of his system for the time being, and is surely ready to move up a gear, while the management will be hoping Maher builds on the promising start he made en route to the league victory last year, before a serious ankle injury effectively scuppered his summer. The early season form and selections here will be especially interesting.

While the only issues over Paul Galvin and Declan O’Sullivan are their appetite for another summer slog, the bogey No 12 jersey is once again up for grabs. Eoin Brosnan, Sean O’Sullivan and Tadhg Kennelly have all had their hands on the left-half forward position before relinquishing it, and so it again is out there to be taken ownership of at the start of 2010.

The handy fit suggests Donncha Walsh, who was unlucky to be dropped for last year’s final, or alternatively Darran O’Sullivan moving out from the corner to facilitate the new Kerry captain, Bryan Sheehan. But while Jack O’Connor may be a South Kerry neighbour, Sheehan must do a lot more than arrive with the armband to warrant his inclusion for the business end of the season.

He produced key interventions for South Kerry on their run to county championship success, but cameos won’t do for Kerry, and if anything, Sheehan starts behind Kenmare’s Paul O’Connor in the attacking pecking order. O’Connor was Kerry’s form forward in the privacy of training last autumn, warranting valuable game time in the All-Ireland series. He’s a year older too, and will be looking to stake a claim in the National League campaign, which begins with a pair of juicy ties at home to Dublin and away to Cork.

Therefore it amounts to a make or break year for Sheehan in some respects. With the honour of captaincy guaranteeing nothing, it again raises the issue of why Kerry are persisting with the traditional system of county champions bestowing the honour of captaincy. Sheehan proved before last year’s final that he’s more than capable of getting the head down and working his way onto the team, and he should be doing that again in 2010 without the burden of captaincy. Better, surely, that Tomás O Sé, Mike McCarthy, Colm Cooper or Paul Galvin be given the armband.

Speaking of Cooper, Barry John Walsh should also be looking to capitalise on Gooch’s traditional early season sabbatical, and Kieran Donaghy will also be gagging for action after his fragmented 2009 campaign.

Bolters? Tousist midfielder Alan O’Sullivan has yet to prove he is ready to step up from the Under-21 All-Ireland winner that he was two years ago, and the main problem for Spa’s Micheal O’Donoghue is the queue of traffic ahead of him for attacking slots.

However with three potential McGrath Cup fixtures before the step-up in standards to Division One of the league, there should be plenty of scope for the wannabes to go from footnotes to form horses.