Crokes chief O’Neill talks up College threat
As the Kerry county champions prepare for Sunday’s provincial club final clash, O’Neill warned his side of the threat ahead.
He said: “I had rated them as a very good divisional team but they are getting to the point now where they are a strong inter-county team. You cannot underestimate this UCC team. In the Cork championship you have a chance early on to take UCC and CIT out of it but if they get momentum going, the longer they stay in the competition then the better and the stronger they will get — like a good divisional team in Kerry.
“Unfortunately for us, these UCC guys are back in college. They are training together, living together and in college together. They are almost like professionals at this stage. They are playing in inter-varsity leagues so they are getting huge practice in, so it’s stronger and stronger that these guys are getting.”
With a strong Kerry connection to the UCC team, O’Neill has an in-depth knowledge of much of the opposition but the Crokes manager is very wary of the momentum and youthful confidence that UCC have behind them.
O’Neill said: “You would expect with college students that they have that air of invincibility around them, especially after the season that they have had.
“Playing Dr Crokes in Killarney in a Munster final will hold no fear for them. A lot of their players will have played against us before — Paul Geaney, Peter Crowley, JB Spillane, Gavan O’Grady — and they will be familiar with our guys. They are young, and they probably have a devil-may-care attitude about the way they play.
“We have a huge responsibility in the club because there is such a huge effort that goes in from the grassroots right up, while for the UCC guys they don’t have that pressure. This is an adventure for them, they will come down here with abandon, ready to take us on.”
Admitting that Dr Crokes have yet to hit top form — needing 0-4 from Colm Cooper in the last quarter of their semi-final to beat Clare side Kilmurry-Ibrickane — O’Neill is demanding improvement from his side in the decider.
“There has to be 15% or 20% more in these guys because we’re not playing as well as we can,” O’Neill said. “We have a lot of soul-searching to do and there are a lot of areas of our game that we need to work on and correct. We can’t keep looking to the likes of Colm (Cooper) and these guys to pull you out of the well every time you go into a big match. We will do everything to try and find that extra few per cent in improvement because we will need it against UCC. We need to move on to the next level in terms of performance to beat UCC. We know what will happen if we don’t so that alone is a huge incentive for guys to up it.”
Meanwhile, Dr Crokes have received a boost with news that key defender Mike Moloney will return to the club next year, having spent this season working in London where the highly-rated defender, who played for Kerry in this year’s McGrath Cup, also starred for London in their All-Ireland football championship campaign.
However, Moloney will be ineligible to play in the All-Ireland club series, should Dr Crokes defeat UCC on Sunday.
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