How Kerry exit could re-energise Tommy Walsh

Don’t get too heavy-handed with the pity sighs. Tommy Walsh’s decision to opt out of the Kerry football set-up is a burden-lifting result for the Tralee man, writes Tony Leen.

There’s been scarcely any enjoyment for the 28-year-old in green and gold over the past two seasons, and no-one on the management team enjoyed seeing him struggle with his football either.

Such was the giddiness surrounding Walsh’s return to the then All-Ireland champions ahead of the 2015 campaign that few paused to consider how medically challenging the hamstring detachment - the type that ended Paul OConnell’s career - would be to recover from.

Walsh hasn’t just struggled in restoring the explosive power that lit up the 2009 All-Ireland win over Cork. He has taken longer than many in the Kerry set-up would have thought to re-acclimatise to required levels of comfort with gaelic football. Working every day with a different-shaped sphere for nearly four years can do that to you.

Hence, it was hardly a galloping shock when word emerged late Wednesday that Walsh had used Sunday’s National League final as a trigger-point in his deliberations to walk away from inter-county football.

For the time being at least.

Though he played in the opening rounds of the League against Dublin in Croke Park and Roscommon in Killarney last January-February, his minutes fell off a cliff thereafter. Six subs were used last Sunday in the final and if Walsh wasn’t employed in those circumstances, he wasn’t going to register much when Johnny Buckley, James O’Donoghue and Paul Geaney returned from injury to the Championship squad.

Amendoeira, on Portugal’s Algarve, is a delightful oasis of warm-weather calm but another week living as a pro in June would have been more than Walsh could bear without some match-time incentivising it.

He returned to club training with Kerins O’Rahillys last night a man liberated. The embarrassment of being treated like a king without a kingdom these last two seasons has sat uncomfortably with the Strand Road man. Perhaps a stint away from the limelight, the expectation and the quizzical looks of ‘why’s he not playing?’ - instead enjoying his club football in Tralee - might stir something and bring about a reassessment of his position.

If he is shorn of the raw pace that carried him away from pursuers six years ago - and maybe that too could return with high tempo game-time - he would be a godsend at midfield or on the edge of the square for Cork (where he lives), Donegal, Mayo and Tyrone, to name but a quartet of sides which plan to be kicking come August.

So how come it not happened with Kerry? There’s an argument, already made on the airwaves yesterday, that he returned too quickly to the inter-county fold after returning from the Sydney Swans at the tail end of 2014.

Undoubtedly, he struggled with his rhythm from the get-go. Unaware of these issues, purists were salivating at the thought of the thrilling dimensions he and Colm Cooper, returning from knee surgery, would offer to Éamonn Fitzmaurice’s 2015 campaign. Word wasn’t long seeping out, however, how Walsh’s kicking accuracy had been compromised by the oval ball of Aussie Rules. That has gotten better over time. Readjusting his game to compensate for a discernible loss of thrust has taken a while longer, and combined with a shaken confidence, has resulted in too many high-numbered jerseys for his, and Kerry’s liking.

This may not be a forever decision. The chances are it won’t be. This is a pressure-valve release as much as an admission of failure.

There were tall tales of post All-Ireland friction last September after Walsh failed to get game time in the losing effort against the Dubs. Nonetheless, as he limbered up on the sideline that day, Walsh’s patience must have been close to breaking point.

It never snapped, though. A good upbringing and exposure to a professional sport environment ensured there was no prospect of prima donna outbursts in the dressing-room or at training. Walsh is as dignified as he is professional. In choosing the moment to leave the Kerry set-up, he informed Fitzmaurice of his decision in a down week for the players, with as little fanfare as he could. Kerry being Kerry, they’ll reconvene for the Championship next week and move on.

A clear-headed Walsh will probably devastate Milltown-Castlemaine on Sunday with his club.

Back in blue. Enjoying his football.