McManamon ready to push on

HE’S already earned legendary status for his All-Ireland final interventions but Dublin’s Kevin McManamon insists he’s still got so much more to offer.

The barrel chested super-sub attacker famously burst through for the 65th minute goal that swung vitalmomentum Dublin’s direction in last month’s defeat of Kerry.

Then, with the game perched at stalemate, he drew the foul that allowed Stephen Cluxton to slot over the winning free in injury-time.

It’s no surprise that McManamon is now feted as an icon in the capital though, judging by his raw ambition, it’s equally no surprise that he’s got bigger fish to fry.

He naturally wants to help Dublin prove they’re a great team by retaining the Sam Maguire in 2012.

And playing an even more central part by becoming a regular is an obvious prime target of the 25-year old, the same progression colleague Paul Flynn and Kerry’s DarranO’Sullivan have made in recent seasons.

“No-one is on that panel to be a sub,” said McManamon at yesterday’s launch of Xbox’s Kinect Sports 2 in Dublin.

“Listen, you don’t want to be remembered as a guy who comes on as a sub.

“Darran would have done it with Kerry (made that progression). It took him a couple of years of biding his time and he ended up captaining a team to an All-Ireland and now he is one of the best players in the country.

“It gives me a lot of encouragement and impetus to get back working hard. I think I have more in me. I think there’s an extra 10 or 15 per cent there.”

On the issue of referee Joe McQuillan’s decision to call a foul for Barry John Keane’s challenge on McManamaon, which led to Cluxton’s winner, the forward offered noapologies to Kerry fans.

“I think it was a free, yeah,” he said.

“The lines are so blurred in the GAA (regarding tackling). I just remember getting the ball and I had built up a bit of speed. I tried to dummy by him and take a bit of contact, thinking that if he tackles me I should have enoughmomentum to get away from him and if I get brought down I get brought down.

“That’s the only thing that would have been going through my head – with the pace I had built up, I was like, ‘listen, I can’t lose here’. It was probably on the borderline. I ran into his leg and fell over. But I think it was a free.”

Kerry’s O’Sullivan attended yesterday’s launch and admitted he’s still coming to terms with the bitter one point defeat. In fact, he said that he won’t be able to forget it until county action begins again next February in the Allianz League.

“I am a thinker,” said O’Sullivan. “I think about this stuff, games you’ve lost, all the time. I will think about the All-Ireland we just lost until we go back. You can’t let these things go. If you win it you enjoy it for a few weeks then you go back and forget about it. But when you lose there are ifs and buts and what have you’s for a long while.”

Despite the eventual defeat and a niggling hamstring injury that affected O’Sullivan throughout, he enjoyed his best season yet with Kerry, winning an All Star award, being shortlisted for Player of the Year and scoring ‘that’ goal against Limerick.

“It was just instinct to be honest,” he recalled of the flick from Bryan Sheehan’s miscued pass at Croke Park. “Sometimes they work out, sometimes they don’t. I won’t be trying it next year!”