St Brendan's Hogan Cup the catalyst for Kerry minors' glory run

Kerry minor football captain Seán O’Shea believes St Brendans’ Hogan Cup win back in April was the foundation upon which a third successful All-Ireland campaign was built.

With just two survivors carrying over from Kerry’s 2015 All-Ireland winning team, O’Shea reckons that the Killarney school’s success, the experience of winning a final of note in Croke Park and the number of players who subsequently graduated to Peter Keane’s panel were the crucial ingredients in Sunday’s three-in-a-row victory.

Six of that Sem team started against Galway, including goalscorers David Clifford, David Shaw, man-of-the-match Dara Moynihan and centre-back Daniel O’Brien. “There is huge work being done in the schools. Dingle won two-in-a-row and you then had the Sem winning this year. There has to be some correlation there because there were six Sem lads starting for Kerry,” said O’Shea.