O’Connor pleased as young guns pass Croker test

Describing him as Happy Jack would be pushing it, but the Kerry manager exhibited a certain hue of satisfaction following Saturday’s opening victory.

Talk of gaining revenge in a league game for what happenedon the biggest stage last year was rightfully redundant but a string of defeats to Dublin had been brought to an end.

A fourth consecutive loss to the All-Ireland champions, following last year’s final and the previous two league meetings, would have been inconceivable for Kerry. Theimportance of stopping the rot wasn’t lost on Jack O’Connor.