LONGFORD SHARSHOOTER BRIAN Kavanagh is likely to be lining out alongside Rory O’Carroll just six days after the two do battle at Croke Park tomorrow.
The 29-year old full forward plays his club football with Kilmacud Crokes in the capital and will be teaming up with several of the Dublin panel when take on Ballyboden St Enda’s in the county championship at Parnell Park next Saturday.
O’Carroll has not been named to start, but there will come a time this afternoon on Jones’ Road, when friendships must be put aside.
The 2013 All-Ireland champions will look to increase their stranglehold on the Leinster championship. Dublin haven’t lost a game in Leinster since Meath beat them 5-9 to 0-13 in 2010 but Kavanagh says no team is invincible.
“You’d be part of teams that have beaten teams with a lot of these lads on them – with Crokes,” said Kavanagh.
“But then, on the flip side of that, you realise what great lads they are – Rory, Cian O’Sullivan, Kevin Nolan. They’re absolute gentlemen; very, very humble; and they work very, very hard.
“You wouldn’t begrudge any of the success that they have had over the last few years.
“But at the same time they do make mistakes, they do have off-days; and we’d need everybody to be on their game and a few of their main players to have off-days for us to have a better chance of winning on Sunday.”
If the big target man lines out at the edge of the square as expected, he’ll eventually come face to face with Crokes clubmate O’Carroll.
The pair frequently knock heads in training, but that inside knowledge won’t be of much use to Kavanagh. He expects to be shadowed all day by his colleague.
“It’s not too often (I get the better of him), no! Rory’s very good; he’s very aggressive in training as well,” said Kavanagh.
“If it’s any of the (Dublin) backs it’s going to be tough. I’m not worried about how we’re going to do at midfield or the backs; I just need to worry about the man I’m marking and try and get the better of him.
“There’s a Crokes WhatsApp and there’s good old banter on it. The ironic thing is I’ll probably be playing with Rory the following Saturday against Ballyboden, so it’s a quick turnaround – five or six days. Hopefully the two of us don’t injure each other anyway!”
Kavanagh was 19 when he made his debut on the bench for Longford as they were hammered by Dublin at Croke Park in 2005.
The Dubs were taken out of their comfort zone and travelled to Pearse Park the following year when they escaped with a narrow victory over Longford.
However Kavanagh knows there’s a big difference between the team that beat Longford by two points back then and the one his side will face tomorrow.
“Dublin are a totally different animal now, totally different. They might have had one or two marquee forwards back then; you’d try to stop them and hold up the whole show. But they come at you from everywhere now.
“And it starts with Stephen Cluxton. Once you kick the ball wide or over the bar, there’s wing-backs, corner-backs, everybody is attacking.
“So it is a huge task and you just have to be so tuned in all the time, because they come from everywhere,” said Kavanagh.
- Daragh Small
