O’Connor bids to end Kerry’s ‘grim’ Páirc Uí Rinn record

Jack O’Connor doesn’t need the stats to be produced. He already knows how poorly Kerry U21 teams have fared in recent times. His summation of the county’s U21 record as “pretty grim” is right on the money.

CORK V KERRY

Tomorrow: Páirc Uí Rinn, 7.30pm

Referee: Alan Kissane (Waterford)

TV: www.tg4.ie

O’Connor’s much-vaunted charges are on the road tomorrow evening for the Eirgrid Munster U21 final against Cork. The venue is Páirc Uí Rinn. David Moloney’s last minute penalty save in the 1997 final replay was the last time a Kerry U21 team secured victory at the Boreenmanna Road venue.

It gets worse. The Kingdom have only one provincial title to their name in the past 15 years, and that came back in 2008. As for tomorrow’s opponents, they haven’t beaten them since 2010. They’ve contested four finals in the interim, failing to land a crown.

The expectation surrounding this latest crop, however, is far removed from any U21 team to pull on the green and gold in recent memory.

It is built on the rock-solid foundation of three All- Ireland minor winning teams. And while they didn’t set the world alight in the opening round against Clare, the team is strengthened by the return of Dr Crokes’ trio, Jordan Kiely, Micheál Burns and Gavin White.

O’Connor, though, doesn’t place much stock in the argument minor success — or three-in-a-row as was the case here — will lead to silverware further up the ladder. “The minor wins guarantee you nothing,” the Kerry manager insisted. “They have developed a great bond and a great understanding from their time at minor, but we can’t afford to be focusing or talking about anything else but Cork considering our record against them, especially in Páirc Uí Rinn.

“Kerry haven’t won up there in 20 years. When you look at the amount of good players who have since gone on to star at senior level, that tells you how difficult the task is going to be. I think the stat that really jumps out is the fact Kerry have only won one Munster U21 title in the last 15 years. That’s a grim statistic.”

Having overseen two (2014 and ’15) of those three minor triumphs, O’Connor is now in his second year as U21 boss.

The 2016 campaign didn’t go to plan as Cork upset the form book when scoring a 3-9 to 1-14 victory in the decider at Austin Stack Park. From that Kerry team, 10 remain on the scene. The nucleus of the side is still there.

“This is the game fellas are really looking forward to for the last 12 months. This is a chance for us to have another go at them. They have 10 fellas from last year and we weren’t good enough for them then. We’ll just see have we improved sufficiently to get one over on them.”

He added: “Sean Powter did a lot of damage that evening. They do have real dangerous forwards. Michael Hurley is playing out of his skin. There is Gary Murphy and Sean O’Donoghue too. We hope our backs will be able to keep tabs on them and our defence will have to be better than it was last year in Tralee because we were opened up very easily. Cork had the upper hand at half-time in that game. While our fellas stuck with it in the second half and made a big comeback, I felt Cork were always going to win the game after the start they had.

“It is important we start well and we don’t allow the Cork runners to cut loose like they did last year.”