WELL, I’M JUST glad I don’t go to the bookies too often.
I think I’ve gotten every big prediction wrong this year and so it was yesterday.
I suppose I hinted last week that I thought it might turn into a bit of a chess match and that’s what we got between two very tactical sides.
It reminded me a lot of the 2011 semi-final when Dublin played the same type of game as Donegal. I suppose a lot of the criticism at the time was directed at Donegal but that’s usually because we tend to be much more critical of losers and talk about all the great things the winners do.
Cruelly for Donegal, the game was decided by a mistake from Paul Durcan and if you gave him a another 100 kick outs he wouldn’t do the same again but, in general, it just wasn’t the greatest spectacle ever.
Looking for positives, and you have to I suppose, we did witness one of the great tactical battles between two managers who put a huge amount of thought into their game plans and that made it an interesting game at least.
As an onlooker, you knew exactly what Donegal would bring but I thought they were flat yesterday which is quite unlike them. Even when they did force a turnover, they didn’t attack with the same gusto or at the same tempo as they did against Dublin. That played into Kerry’s hands.
For the winners. If they’d gone out and played free-flowing and attractive football, they’d probably have lost so you can’t blame them for cutting their cloth to measure. Thinking about it, they’re one of the few teams in the country capable of adopting their game in so many ways and changing their game-plan completely from game to game but that’s always been the case when them.
Before Mick O’Dwyer came in, Kerry were known as a kick and catch team and they enjoyed a lot of success with that. But when Micko took over, they became a team that ran at the opposition and had even more success after that.
Even in more recent times, after being bullied and out-muscled by Tyrone and other Ulster teams, Kerry went away and came back bigger and stronger and we saw the benefit of that yesterday, there was no way they were going to be out-fought by Donegal.
As I said Friday, I really thought Donegal’s experience of winning an All-Ireland just two years ago would have stood to them, that it would have helped them over the line but, in a way, I think Kerry benefited from the fact that some of their lads went into yesterday’s game with no pressure on them.
At the start of the year, nobody outside of Munster would have heard of a lot of those lads like Paul Murphy or Peter Crowley so they’d nothing to lose and showed they have that natural ability to go out and just express themselves.
Yet there were times yesterday, when Donegal bounced back after the second Kerry goal, that you thought they would just have too much about them and find a way to win. In tight games, players like Michael Murphy or either of the McGees usually do the business for Donegal and secure narrow the win but it just didn’t happen this time.
So Kerry deserve huge credit for their mental strength. It’s hard to put your finger on where it came from with such a relatively inexperienced group of players but I suppose they’re just made of different stuff down there.
Whereas in Kildare a young lad will tell you he dreams of playing for the county, in Kerry they dream of winning All-Irelands with the county. You can’t train that mindset into lads.
Star
I have to mention Kieran Donaghy and the impact he’s had on Kerry’s year. He probably won’t earn an All-Star – and I don’t think he should because you have to take the year as a whole – but they would not be All-Ireland champions without his contribution.
He gave them the spark to get over the line against Mayo and was a key cog in the machine yesterday so he’ll probably be having a word in Éamonn Fitzmaurice’s ear today and letting him know just what Kerry could achieve if he plays all year in 2015.
And speaking of the Kerry manager, I must commend the job he has done this year.
Kerry lost huge, iconic, figures before the start of this season, lads that will be remembered in 100 years. Not just players but legends of the game and to replace them the way he has is incredible.
If you look at the way he has managed Declan O’Sullivan – twice All-Ireland winning captain – this season and how O’Sullivan has accepted his role as a panel member and the respect he clearly has for his boss, that’s just brilliant coaching. It proves he has buy-in from the players and that they realise he knows exactly what he’s doing.
I’m sure talk in a lot of offices and workplaces today will be about the All-Stars and who will be player of the year but for me it has to be James O’Donoghue.
I know there’ll be an awful lot of hands up, lads like Paul Flynn, Cillian O’Connor, Michael Murphy and Diarmuid Connolly have all had cracking summers but it has to be James for me.
While there was very little expectation around Kerry in general, there was a lot of pressure on him personally as Kerry’s main scoring threat and he delivered brilliantly. A lot of people will look at the goal he scored against Mayo to earn the replay but for me his performance against Cork sets him apart from the other contenders.
His ten points, eight from play, reminded me of Frank McGuigan’s against Armagh in the Ulster final in 1984. People are still raving about that performance to this day and I think the same will go for O’Donoghue’s against Cork in the Munster final.
Looking back on the year in general, I do wonder if people are right and is it time for us to take a look at the provincial championships.
Don’t get me wrong, my most treasured possession is my Leinster winners medal and for a lot of teams winning a provincial title might be as good as it gets, but you have to look at how many sides can realistically win the All-Ireland and if it’s less than a three or four, then something has to be looked at.
