Donaghy ready for year without absent friends

LESS than four years after Jack O’Connor re-invented him as a target man at full-forward, you know that Kieran Donaghy has established himself his seniority in the Kerry football set-up when he talks about the ‘younger’ players coming through.

And despite the fact that theAll-Ireland champions have lost what he describes as “five big men down the middle” from the side which defeated Cork last September, he is satisfied that the resources are there to successfully re-build the team.

Donaghy, whose own recovery of fitness – and form – will enable him to take over the role filled by Tommy Walsh in the attack, believes that the work himself and David Moran are doing in training will facilitate the O’Rahillys man in reprising Tadhg Kennelly’s function in attack. And, in the context of Darragh O Se’s departure from midfield, he feels the time is coming for Micheal Quirke to consolidate his position in the team.

Moran was one of the players who impressed in Kerry’s strong second-half rally against Derry in Tralee on Sunday, especially in the way he linked up with Donaghy. “David and myself had been working on that for the last couple of weeks. It’s going to take him a bit of time to get used to playing into that role – he is more used to playing around the middle. It’s different at centre-forward, but he has been practising in training and working really hard on it,’’ he commented.

“We’d be looking more towards the summer that he’ll get that perfected. We have a nice mix there with Declan and Darran and Colm Cooper going in and out. That gave us a different look and we were happy with the way things went.”

While acknowledging the huge loss of Diarmuid Murphy, Mike McCarthy (likely), Darragh O Se, Kennelly and Walsh, Donaghy is upbeat about how the team strength can be restored.

“I wouldn’t exactly say we’re in dire straits. We are just trying to come to terms with the loss of so many quality players and it’s tough in the early days. But I would be hoping that come the championship, we will be adjusted to life without the lads and ready for battle”

Pleased that David O’Callaghan was able to build on what he had managed as a substitute in the previous round in Pairc Ui Rinn, he welcomed the return of Anthony Maher who was sidelined last year by an ankle injury. “He is player that we will be looking to for the future to give us something this summer at midfield.

“He is a big strong man, and it’s great to see him back.

“We have a lot of quality coming through. We have Mike Quirke who has been pushing for a place for a couple of years and you would hope that he would push hard this year.

“It’s great to see all the young fellows coming in. There are the U21’s that were missing because they are playing Cork next Saturday, so there is great youth in this squad.

“We are looking forward to moving on with them this summer and in the next couple of years.”

Donaghy added that making a big push to win the league title last year proved counter-productive. It meant that after losing to Cork in the Munster championship, they ‘spent the qualifiers’ trying to regain their form. Then, they ‘hit Dublin ‘like a tsunami’ in Croke Park.

“This is what the league is all about. I thought last year that we failed to find out anything about ourselves. We won every game and drew with Dublin in Parnell Park, so we learned nothing about ourselves.

“Then we went down to Páirc Uí Chaoimh in the championship and Cork sent us packing. I think it’s better this year because we found out a few things in the first two games this year which we lost and we can learn from those and work on things and build for the future.

“You are always going to lose players from year to year and that is the way life is. Teams have always lost players down the years and this is a big moment for this Kerry team now – with the players that we have lost and the calibre and class of the players. The challenge now is can we unearth a few players and can we replace the lads that are gone.’’

Kerry coach Jack O’Connor talked enthusiastically after Sunday about being close to having ‘a full deck’ to pick from, with their injuries list clearing up and only Paul Galvin and Tomás O Sé to return. Aidan O’Shea wasn’t started on Sunday because of a minor groin problem – “we felt if we played him, it would have put him back a couple of weeks” – and Donncha Walsh might have recovered fully from a slight hamstring problem to be available for selection next Sunday.

Delighting in Donaghy’s form since recovering from the injury which sidelined him for most of last season, the Kerry boss has no doubt that he is back to the player he was a couple of years ago.

“That’s great news for us, we just need to get fellows feeding off him a bit now and getting a bit more out of the ball he is winning.”