Kingdom find the spark to lift the gloom

Revenge? Retribution? Resurrection? None of the above.

In the cold light of day, Kerry will, or at least should, regard this as nothing more than a win over a transitional team minus key players barely recognisable from their wonder years.

One qualifier victory was never going to compensate for two All-Ireland final defeats never mind an epoch-defining semi-final reverse.

But a defeat? A defeat would have been unthinkable.

In those 70-something minutes on Saturday, a sea of shoulders were unloaded. Kerry’s hopes and fears of all those nine years manifested themselves and Fitzgerald Stadium rejoiced in a most satisfying form of catharsis.

Kerry’s players had kept their counsel in the run-up to the game but pain had been a motivator. Watch how Declan O’Sullivan welcomed Brian McGuigan to the game. Witness Stephen O’Neill’s rough introduction. Two men who, in their prime, had speared the Kingdom.

Kerry were not the worst aggressors in a game even uglier than last Sunday week’s game in Mullingar.

But as Tyrone rankled and raved in their refusal to accept the home side’s superiority, Kerry weren’t going to turn the other cheek.

While McGuigan’s sending off just seconds after coming on was harsh, Conor Gormley, Owen Mulligan and Ryan McMenamin were fortunate to stay on the pitch. Kerry substitute Paddy Curtin escaped with just a yellow card for a cynical challenge late on.

The 16 yellow card count indicated just how forgettable an affair this was but performance-wise Kerry produced their best so far of the Championship.

The fluidity and expressiveness Jack O’Connor had been looking for in the forward line was evident as Declan O’Sullivan and Paul Galvin impressed while Colm Cooper took over after the break from where James O’Donoghue left off in the first-half.

Carrying on from their second-half against Westmeath, the Kerry defence enjoyed another good day out, with Shane Enright looking water-tight despite only being drafted into the team during the week.

Aidan O’Mahony held Mulligan scoreless, his third consecutive shut-out this summer, while the Ó Sés, Tomás marking his record-equalling 81st SFC appearance, were their usual dutiful selves.

In front of almost 25,000 people, O’Connor couldn’t countenance a loss to Tyrone – and he knew his players couldn’t either.

“We had 3,500 Kerry supporters above in Mullingar last week and we expected 300. They gave us a great lift and they helped us to get out of jail.

“We knew during the week that there was going to be a massive Kerry crowd here and it would be unthinkable to lose in front of them.

“They’ve backed us through thick and thin, we’ve had some great days together and we wanted to get back to Croke Park. We felt we left an All-Ireland behind us last year, and that’s not taking anything away from the Dubs.

“We just want to get back into a quarter-final and it would have been awful to lose in front of our own supporters. It would be an awful way for this team to finish up.”

With the winds at their backs, Kerry should have been further than just four ahead (0-8 to 0-4) at the interval.

O’Connor and Mickey Harte agreed on that count and their scoring opportunities clocked in around the high teens.

Kerry found more purchase kicking into their inside forwards while Tyrone, against the wind, struggled against an impressive Kerry screen.

Kerry went five ahead twice in the first five minutes of the second-half before Joe McMahon’s shot deflected off Tomás Ó Sé and into the Kerry net in the 44th minute.

“That was a tough blow because I thought it was against the run of play,” said O’Connor. “I thought we were pretty much in control of the game at the time.”

But Kerry strike back almost immediately, Bryan Sheehan integrally involved in a move which saw him exchange with Cooper and then airing a nicely-weighed hand-pass for Donaghy to palm to the net.

“It was important that the big man (Donaghy) got the goal pretty much straight away. It was very much like Mullingar last weekend. Darran (O’Sullivan) got a goal straight after the penalty. That was important because it gave us the confidence to play after that.”

From there on, Kerry bossed proceedings. Anthony Maher had been ruling the roost in the first-half but the introduction of an extra midfielder in Aidan Cassidy took away from some of his influence.

Still, Kerry were quickest to the breaks and Tomás Ó Sé’s perfectly-shaped sweeps to the wings were hurting Tyrone.

Cooper had also come alive and he was involved in the build-up to O’Donoghue’s 49th minute point, which put Kerry five ahead.

After McGuigan’s dismissal, three unanswered points came from his boots – the last of the greeted by the player with a celebratory fist to the crowd as the result became apparent.

Donaghy did the same after fisting a point having been found by a lovely Marc Ó Sé high ball and Paddy Curtin added the cherry in the 67th minute.

“A week ago we were dead and buried, but thankfully we got out of the grave again,” remarked O’Connor. “We felt that we weren’t as bad as people made us out to be. We played against a fired-up Westmeath team last week, we were six points down ten minutes into the second half and we came back to win the game. People didn’t take that on its merits, we felt we did very well to get out of there and it was the perfect dress-rehearsal for the game today.”

As for whether it will wake Kerry from their summer slumber, O’Connor shrugged: “We’re hoping it will spark us because we’ve been lacking a bit of a spark all the year. We hope it sparks us but you never know. They’re human beings, they’re not robots. They can’t just turn it on and off depending but sometimes this crowd need the gun put to their head to play and the gun was to our heads. No question about that.”

With Croke Park on the horizon, though, it’s Clare now looking down the barrel.

Scorers for Kerry: C Cooper 0-5 (1 free); K Donaghy 1-1; Declan O’Sullivan, B Sheehan (all frees) 0-3 each; J O’Donoghue 0-2; P Galvin, P Curtin 0-1 each.

Scorers for Tyrone: T Ó Sé og 1-0; C Cavanagh, C Clarke, D McCurry, M Penrose (free), A Cassidy, S O’Neill 0-1 each.

Subs for Kerry: Darran O’Sullivan for Walsh (49); P Crowley for Enright (65); K O’Leary for Declan O’Sullivan, B Maguire for Young (inj), P Curtin for O’Donoghue (all 66).

Subs for Tyrone: R McMenamin for Carlin (inj 11);, D McCaul for McNamee (33); A Cassidy for Mattie Donnelly (35); S O’Neill for Penrose (47); B McGuigan for McCrory (52).

Red card: B McGuigan (straight, 52).

Referee: David Coldrick (Meath).