Kerry selector Aodán Mac Gearailt on Graham O'Sullivan's transformed role

"For me, playing half-forward isn't that different to playing half-back under the modern rules," said Mac Gearailt.

TRANSFORMED ROLE: Graham O'Sullivan is tackled by James McCarthy and Ciaran Kilkenny of Dublin. Pic: Brendan Moran/Sportsfile.

Graham O’Sullivan’s 2022 breakout season concluded with a display that offers clues to his current role.

Although wearing No.2 and named at corner-back for the concluding Sunday of fare three summers ago, O’Sullivan found himself as the spare person in the Kerry defence and so found himself covering ground far beyond his corner-back patch.

A couple of days after the All-Ireland final win over Galway, the eulogising of his old UCC boss Billy Morgan offered further clues as to his current role.

“Because he is such a good footballer, he can play anywhere on the pitch. He always had the football, and he has the know-how to go along with it. He was the ideal person to be the free man because we knew he’d use the ball well,” Morgan told the Irish Examiner.

For this latest All-Ireland final, No.2 has been swapped for No.12. The swap was not seamless. In the extra-time Munster semi-final epic against Cork, O’Sullivan seemed lost in the chaos.

His role and its effectiveness were hard to distinguish. It was another three championship games further on before he was again in the half-forward line at throw-in. Time spent in that line is brief.

“We looked at the new rules and what we could work on that might benefit us. And one of the things we looked at was converting, if you want to use that word, players with serious athleticism,” explained Kerry selector Aodán Mac Gearailt.

“Because, for me, playing half-forward isn't that different to playing half-back under the modern rules because you're actually going to have to go forward when your team is attacking, and you're going to have to go back when you're defending.

“It's not necessarily man-marking either. So it's players that can cover certain roles, and the role we wanted him to to cover, he was ideal. He ticked an awful lot of boxes for us. So it wasn't a difficult decision to make, and I felt it was pretty seamless, while Graham might have said himself he struggled at the start.”

Struggling no more, even if the less glamorous grafting rarely puts him in the spotlight. Mind you, it’s a role, such is the opposition’s flying column attacks, that could put him centre stage for another final.

“There's an awful lot of running involved. His GPS will be through the roof after games. So I have nothing but respect for what he does. I wouldn't say it's a thankless job, but it doesn't always get seen. But if he's not doing his job, there's lots of gaps in our defence.

“And if he's not doing his job on the other end of the field, you're not creating space for other forwards. I'm so proud of the fact that he's adapted to the role so effectively and so quickly. As a management, we can't take credit for that. We just had to put our trust in him.”

Mac Gearailt’s first exposure to Jack O’Connor was when graduating straight from the Kerry minor set-up into the U21 fold at the end of the 1990s. For all three years, Jack was the man in the middle of the dressing-room.

“I'd see him a lot calmer in my role as a selector than when I was a player, definitely. He's very straight, which I like about him. He's straight with the players. He’s very protective of them.

"It was a difficult position to be in after Meath to try and get everyone refocused and almost rewired to go again. And credit to him, he managed to turn that around and get the whole thing going again.”