'He's back training fully': Boost for Kerry as Tom O'Sullivan returns ahead of Dublin semi

O’Sullivan hasn’t featured inside the whitewash since limping out of the April 25 Munster semi-final win over Clare with a calf injury

FIGHTING FIT: Tom O'Sullivan has returned to full training with Kerry. Pic: Ray McManus/Sportsfile.

Kerry corner-back Tom O’Sullivan has returned to full training and is in line to bridge the 11-week gap to his last championship involvement in Sunday’s All-Ireland semi-final against Dublin.

O’Sullivan, who hasn’t featured inside the whitewash since limping out of the April 25 Munster semi-final win over Clare with a calf injury, did end up on the bench against Tyrone after being a late promotion from the standby list for the injured Brian Ó Beaglaoich.

“Tom is fine. He's back training fully,” said Kerry boss Jack O’Connor on Monday evening.

The injury update on 2025 All-Star goalkeeper Shane Ryan and All-Star half-back Ó Beaglaoich is less emphatic, though, with Jack reporting that the pair are only engaged in a “bit of training” at present.

Half-back Ó Beaglaoich made his second start and only third appearance of the year in the Round 3 win over Armagh on June 20, but was unable to tog for the Tyrone fixture a week later because of a back spasm.

Shane Ryan, the same as Ó Beaglaoich, was pulled last-minute from the county’s All-Ireland quarter-final matchday panel after aggravating the quad muscle injury which has kept him sidelined thus far in 2026.

“Shane Ryan is doing bits. He's not fully at it yet, so we'll see how he's going this coming week,” Jack continued.

Despite almost falling to Wicklow in their opening Leinster bout, and later back-to-back defeats to Westmeath and Louth, Jack admitted to being totally unsurprised that Dublin have survived to the championship’s last four.

His argument is that when you’ve as many Celtic Crosses in the dressing-room as Dublin do, there is always the capacity to ride out any turbulent spell.

“Those players didn't become bad players overnight. They still have lads with five or six All-Ireland medals. Kilkenny, Con O'Callaghan, Scully, Paddy Small, Costello, Basquel, Bugler, Howard, Davy Byrne and these fellas - they still have massive quality and huge experience in that group.

“They obviously struggled with injuries and the suspension to Ger Brennan obviously didn't help. So I always felt that if they got their men back and got on a bit of a run, they were going to be highly dangerous. You don't lose that quality. The store of experience and know-how is in their DNA. You don't lose that.

“You might lose a bit of motivation here and there but once they got a smell of it and got on a bit of a run, and the crowd have come back obviously in a big way.

“It's about building slowly and just hanging in there until the business end of it and then putting your best foot forward. That's what Dublin have done. There were times that they struggled this year, but they survived. That collective experience has stood to them. They didn't panic. They've obviously turned a big corner now and they'll be highly dangerous.”

Across the last eight championship meetings between football’s traditional standard-bearers, Kerry have emerged victorious on only one occasion. Such a lopsided head-to-head of late will feed a lack of fear in the blue camp, reckons the Kerry manager.

“They'll say to themselves that Kerry have only beaten us once in the last eight and that was by a point with a fairly iconic kick by Seánie [O'Shea], so they'll say, 'We'll take these fellas down the stretch and we'll still have it over them'. That's the way they'll be thinking.”