O’Grady puts friendship on ice for final
Less than two weeks ago, O’Grady and two of the Dr Crokes footballers he will face in the Kerry final at Fitzgerald Stadium, Killarney — Daithí Casey and Johnny Buckley — were all pulling in the same direction as they starred in UCC’s Cork SFC triumph over Castlehaven. But the trio are in opposite corners this Sunday.
“We will have to put friendships aside for the day. It’s been a great few weeks and it would be perfect now to top it off on Sunday with a Mid Kerry win. But Daithí and Johnny will be thinking the same thing. You try and learn a few things when you are training with them with UCC but there will be no love lost the next day, we’ll be tearing into each other.”
Whatever the result on Sunday, O’Grady will be lining out for UCC in the Munster club championship — Mid Kerry are a divisional team and cannot compete in the provincial series, even if they are Kerry champions — but Casey and Buckley are expected to stay loyal to Killarney club Dr Crokes, if it retains its crown.
With that in mind, O’Grady jokes a few UCC team-mates have added some extra pressure. “If UCC win against Monaleen, there is a chance we could be running into the Crokes at some stage so the boys in Cork are telling me to do a job on the Crokes, so Daithí and Johnny will be available for UCC.”
Drawing on his experience of the Cork county final, the in-form Mid Kerry forward can see some similarities between the Cork and Kerry football deciders. “It’s still a county final, no matter where it’s on. It’s still a massive game. You still get the nerves,” O’Grady said. “But they are different in a lot of ways as well. With Mid Kerry, I will be playing with some of the lads that I grew up playing with and against, while with UCC you might only know the lads for a year or so. But there is still a strong bond there.
“Not too many players get the opportunity to win two county championships in the same year. This is where you want to be. These are the days you live for, the days you train for, and this is what you put your boots on for.”
Meanwhile, Mid Kerry manager Tim Coffey, in his second year in charge of the divisional outfit, is well aware of the task awaiting his side.
“In terms of a county final, then it doesn’t come much tougher than Dr Crokes. They have been the most consistent club team in Kerry for the last number of years and they are the reigning county champions,” Coffey said.
“If you look at them over the last number of years, how many times have they contested the county championship final? It tells you a lot about the calibre of player that the Crokes have. We are up against it. We know that.”
Coffey is also wary of Dr Crokes’ forward power: “You can talk about the Gooch, you can talk about Kieran O’Leary but then you also have Daithí Casey, Andrew Kenneally, Brian Looney, Jamie Doolan, the list goes on. I have come across them all over the years, and every one of them are match-winners on their day. We know how good the Dr Crokes’ forwards are and we know that we will have to watch them very closely.”
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