Kerry future looks bright, Cork look short in every sense

“Gearóid White is not 16 until August, which is absolutely off the charts,” says Kerry minor boss Wayne Quillinan.

Wed, 15 May, 2024 - 07:10

Eoghan Cormican

Even when the grade was at U18, making sizable pronouncements about minor talents was never too healthy a past-time to engage in.

At the current U17 limit, sizable pronouncements are even less advisable.

And then a kid like Gearóid White comes along and does what he did on Munster final evening. From eight shots, off left and right, there were eight points, including one long-range free that didn’t pose the slightest of problems to the Kerry half-forward.

And then you hear that White is not even U17, that he is U16, and so will be back to torment Cork and every other minor defence he comes into contact with next year.

And then, to cap it all off, you find out that he is only 15 years of age and is currently preparing for his Junior Cert.

That sizable pronouncement is becoming harder and harder to stay quiet on.

“Gearóid is not 16 until August, which is absolutely off the charts,” says Kerry minor boss Wayne Quillinan.

“I’m doing this a long time now, I’ve coached hundreds and hundreds of players, but he’s definitely up there.

“His application, his desire to be better, he’s just so grounded. First and foremost, what a wonderful young fella, but as a footballer, he has a serious future ahead of him, because I know he’ll keep grounded and keep focused.”

When dealing with players of such a young age on such a sizable stage, Quillinan would prefer to see them built up than have praise tempered for fear of any negative spin-off.

“When they’re so young, the most important thing that they can hear is ‘I believe in you, I’ve confidence in you’.

“Everyone has been talking about Ronan Carroll (full-forward) for the last two games, he has been judged on two games, but he had such a great year with the school (Tralee CBS) and club (Austin Stacks), and then people judge him on two games.

“We backed him, and he showed us tonight. That’s the thing, you have to give the guys the confidence. You keep backing them, and he produced. Nobody was stripping the ball from him for that penalty.”

Tomás Ó Sé: This Kerry team is the most honest bunch of lads I've come across

Where Kerry plan with optimism for an All-Ireland quarter-final against the beaten Connacht finalists on Saturday, June 8, Cork manager Haulie O’Sullivan must try and lift his players after Monday’s 15-point reddening.

The bigger picture is that Cork football must try and sort itself out after the year’s fifth championship defeat to Kerry. Twice at minor, twice at U20, and of course the Munster senior semi-final, teams in red have fallen varying levels of short against the green and gold.

At minor and U20, the greatest gap has not been on the scoreboard but rather the gulf in size and physicality. Kerry weren’t just better in the Munster minor and U20 deciders, they were noticeably bigger.

In that S&C department, Cork have work to do.

“It’s very disappointing. None of us saw this coming,” O’Sullivan said of Monday’s 2-18 to 1-6 rout.

“We struggled in every sector of the pitch. It’s more disappointing for the players because they know that they are better than that. They just collectively didn’t show up. It wasn’t just one or two players, it was across the board. It was as poor a performance as we could have imagined.

“We weren’t getting the ball fast enough out of our defence, we weren’t breaking the tackle. We knew this was coming, we knew Kerry would push up and put you under pressure at the top third of the pitch. It’s easy to talk about it, and practice it in training, but it just didn’t happen.”

The Cork manager is hoping the vagaries of youth won’t keep his players down for long. Their season does not end with this disappointment. There is an All-Ireland quarter-final against the Connacht champions to redeem themselves.

“I think the group of footballers that we have are better than what they showed today. I said this a few times recently, one thing you can’t be certain of is whether the players will show up or not on the big day because they are very young. The opposite also applies, young fellas get over things very fast. They are proud to play for Cork. They want to represent Cork in a better manner than what they did tonight.

“Our own mental state, regrouping and getting our morale back are the key things now at the moment. We will get the show back on the road first, and we’ll worry about Connacht later. The morale is good, they must make their minds up that they’re going to have a cut off this.”