Kingdom cautious on Gooch eye injury
Cooper has been busy with club commitments with Dr Crokes over the past few months but his return to Jack O’Connor’s setup has been delayed by concerns over an eye injury.
Cooper was sidelined last year with an eye injury he incurred in a league game against Monaghan in April
“When it’s an eye injury you have to be very careful”, stated Kerry selector Ger O’Keeffe. “That’s what Colm is doing and we’re not going to rush him back until he gets the all clear. It’s expected he’ll hear from the eye specialist over the coming days.”
Kerry defender Aidan O’Mahony has also undergone an x-ray after being forced off with a wrist injury in the second-half on Sunday.
Meanwhile Darran O’Sullivan has said nobody should be surprised he performed well at centre-forward in Kerry’s defeat to Cork on Sunday.
The Glenbeigh-Glencar man is known more as a wing or corner-forward at inter-county level but has filled the central role this year as Declan O’Sullivan enjoys his honeymoon. The 24-year-old was handed the TG4 man of the match award for his efforts in Tralee and it’s a position he is hoping to keep.
“It is not a strange position to me,” said O’Sullivan. “I played there throughout under-age for as long as I can remember. It’s always been my favourite position. I enjoy playing in there, there’s a lot of space. You have options left and right when you’re in the centre instead of being out on the wing when you can only go one way. Obviously I’m enjoying it, hopefully I can keep it going and hopefully I can keep improving with every game.”
Despite the loss, O’Sullivan pointed out Kerry had shown as much quality in recovering from their second-half barren spell to take the lead as Cork demonstrated in winning the contest at the death.
“We showed good character in coming back and taking the lead and they showed good character in holding on to it. The two teams have been around a long time, there are players on both teams that have seen it all. Their experience showed to get them over the line.”
O’Sullivan also argued that despite Cork’s physicality, Kerry “weren’t overpowered by any matter of means“.
He’s looking forward to possibly returning the “favour” in the Munster SF championship.
“Yeah, you always look forward to Cork games. Maybe we could have done with a bit extra training but they could say the same. At this time of the year it’s not easy clapping them onto the field but that’s the way it goes, we always look forward to playing the best teams around and Cork are certainly one of them.”
