Kealy: New-look Kingdom must continue rebuilding

NEW Kerry goalkeeper Brendan Kealy believes the county have to look at “the bigger picture” this season as their new-look squad comes to terms with a number of absentees from last year’s campaign.

Sunday’s defeat against Mayo in Tralee means Kerry are facing a battle to stay in Division 1 of the NFL, with ties against Tyrone and Monaghan coming up, but Kealy reckons the priority needs to be to bed new players into their side.

“I suppose this year there really is a bigger picture to be looked at. It’d be nice at the same time to be challenging for honours. But the priority has to be blooding new players and hopefully it’ll prove beneficial later in the year. Tyrone will be a tough match away next Saturday and then Monaghan the week after. We should learnt a lot from those games. The experience is brilliant of playing in league matches against top teams, and that’s the same not just for myself, but other fellas new to the setup. Sunday was disappointing, especially as we just didn’t seem to come back at all when they took over in the second half.”