Ciarán McKeever: Kerry 'not the force that their name carries anymore'
Selectors Ciarán McKeever, right, and Kieran Donaghy during an Armagh Media Conference ahead of the All-Ireland SFC final at the Carrickdale Hotel in Dundalk, Louth. Picture: Harry Murphy/Sportsfile
“Not the force that their name carries anymore.” Armagh selector Ciarán McKeever’s assessment of Kerry is a brutal one but it had been their approach to last Saturday week’s All-Ireland semi-final.
Prior to the game, it had been 18 years since their previous championship meeting. In their last couple of Division 1 meetings in 2022 and ’23 Kerry were winners by a margin of one score each time.
McKeever doesn’t say what role, if any Armagh’s Kerry selector Kieran Donaghy played in helping the panel distinguish the mystique around their opposition from the team they were facing but it had been a discussion point.
“There’s no doubt about it that it (the victory) gives you confidence but the big thing is a lot of Kerry’s name at the minute is based on history. It’s based on history. Yes, they won the All-Ireland two years but they’re not the force that their name carries anymore.
“We were fully aware of that leading into the weekend, we were fully confident that we could execute what we were going up the road to do and if we didn’t play the occasion or didn’t play the occasion that it was Kerry.
“We were trying to deliver that message a lot over the fortnight and thankfully we went up the road and did the job because we had really good confidence that we could turn them over in Croke Park.”
Going back to his playing days, McKeever has never been afraid to speak his mind. Kieran McGeeney insisted he wasn’t worried when his future as manager was the subject of a vote last August but his old team-mate and selector was the opposite.
“You’re thinking the worst because you have helmets voting and that’s just the truth. You’ve people that are in clubs that have agendas potentially, just don’t like his personality, that are going to have a say on what way the county team is going to go and what the players are going to get.
“Lucky enough, we have a really strong of players that weren’t willing to allow that to happen. A couple of strong clubs stood up and it is what it is, he got the vote, and we are where we are today.”
In a backroom team full of Ciaráns or Kierans including Ciarán McKinney, there has to be nicknames. “Geezer” and “Star” are the more known ones. McKeever is “Brooky” having lived and played soccer in Bessbrook.
He came in at the same time as Donaghy in 2020 having jumped in as minor manager in 2018, the year after he retired. “I was sent down with a specific job to do, to look for missing links that Geezer wanted to try and embed into a senior set-up.
“It’s probably no coincidence that we felt we were lacking a bit of pace in different areas of the pitch and there’s probably where Petie McGrane and Oisín Conaty have come from.”
A panel had to be developed.
“Geezer has been hammering that drum since I was there. We didn't have the squad. Truth be told, we weren't at that level. That's just the harsh reality of it. We felt over the last five or six years that we've potentially had that squad but we just weren't getting it going down the stretch in big games.”
McKeever says the softer, funnier side of McGeeney is now emerging in the media. “You’re probably seeing the proper side of him - he's coming out with one liners.”
After losing a second Ulster final in a row on penalties, after the group insisted in the dressing room that the result “wasn’t going to define our season”, McGeeney let the group go on the rip for a couple of days.
“We went and enjoyed each other's company Sunday and Monday,” recalls McKeever. “We got together Tuesday night and we were ready to go again and this was the target, to see could we get to here.
“Every away match, we stop the bus in some random pub and go in and have a pint together. When we drew with Galway (in Sligo last month) and coming out the road we stopped the bus and had a pint and enjoyed each other’s time and were on the bus home again.”
Their row that spoiled their 2022 All-Ireland quarter-final meeting mightn’t have suggested it but the Armagh and Galway groups, at least the managements, are close. McKeever refers to Pádraic Joyce as “Joycey”.
“If I’m putting my hand on my heart, they’re probably the best team we’ve played over the last four years and how they structurally set up, they set up like an Ulster team.
“They’re really athletic, I think their whole half-forward line is averaging 6ft2in. They’re big, they’re powerful and obviously they have the three boys inside, Comer, Shane Walsh that are exceptional finishers. They’re a really dangerous team. “
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