Kingdom Cruise to 35th Title

Irish Voice Sport

Kingdom Cruise to 35th Title

September 24, 2007

By Frank Shouldice

Kerry 3-13 Cork 1-9

A FITTING end to a poor championship football season. Defending All-Ireland champions Kerry completed a rout over hapless Cork in a decider that effectively ground to a half after just 36 minutes.

It was anti-climactic all round, miserable for Rebel fans and vaguely satisfying for Kerry supporters, mindful only that their toughest outing all year was when they shaded Monaghan by a single point.

All the talk of Munster rivalry making the All-Ireland final a tough call proved groundless with Pat O’Shea’s team cruising to a 10-point victory. They pilfered three goals thanks to calamitous defending that will leave Cork goalkeeper Alan Quirke prone to nightmares.

The first arrived in the 15th minute when Seamus Scanlon drifted a high ball towards the square. Gooch Cooper, looking razor sharp from the throw-in, shuffled around Kieran O’Connor and got his fist to the ball ahead of the red and white blur around him. It nestled in the net and Kerry were 1-3 to 0-3 ahead, taking a lead they would never lose.

The first half was strewn with fouls and Kerry raised the physical stakes by stopping Cork defenders coming out with the ball. New defenders Padraig Reidy and Killian Young impressed, while midfield, the big hope for Cork, saw most broken ball tilt to the Kingdom.

Nicholas English made little impression, and while his counterpart Dara Ó Sé did not have it all his own way -– Scanlon got through a lot of work -– Kerry’s half-backs and half-forwards snapped up loose ball and worked it through to Kieran Donaghy and Cooper on the full-forward line.

Bryan Sheehan also kicked a couple of points with ease while Cork relied on frees to stay in touch. Michael Cussen, unable to drive home height advantage against Tom O’Sullivan, clipped their only point from play in the first half, but Kerry threatened to carve it wide open, moving the ball at pace.

Cooper might have followed his goal with another when he tore through the defense only to blast over the bar from eight yards. Graham Canty was switched to mark, Cooper but the move simply freed up Donaghy while Cooper continued to do significant damage with sublime footwork and speed of thought.

James Masters was withdrawn at halftime but like those around him, replacement Daniel Goulding had to wait a while before even seeing the ball. Trailing by 0-6 to 1-6 at the break, Cork might have raised their game but they had too many problems and simply do not have the quality in depth that Kerry possess.

They missed Anthony Lynch in defense -– he replaced Jon Miskella after 42 minutes -– but it was Ger Spillane’s error on the restart that really sealed the issue.

The Cork center-back delayed on the ball coming out of defense after a Kerry attacking move broke down. Donaghy robbed Spillane of the ball, looking up in amazement to find the net gaping empty in front of him. Goalkeeper Quirke had moved left to take a pass from Spillane and when Donaghy gained possession, he had to check himself before tapping it over the unguarded line.

Cork needed a big restart but their heads dropped in the face of such a disastrous collapse. Over the next six minutes Kerry tacked on four points without reply.

Cooper, Declan O’Sullivan, Sheehan and Paul Galvin pressed home the advantage. Billy Morgan watched helplessly as his team imploded.

The gulf in class was too great to even make it interesting, and then Donaghy stole between Quirke and Michael Shields to rap home into an unprotected net for the third time.

On this showing it was hard to fathom that Cork could possibly be the second-best team in the country. Just as last year when Mayo got blown away, it is a credit to Pat O’Shea that his team were primed, lean and hungry to do the job they came to do.

Having learned the hard way against Tyrone they have upped the physical aspect of their game, hitting hard and combining to release virtuoso talents like Cooper and O’Sullivan. Even subs Sean O’Sullivan and Tommy Griffin look capable of commanding a starting place with any other team in the country.

It may have been Kerry’s 35th title but they wanted this one like the 34 before it and will now stake a claim to three in-a-row.

Goulding did well to hit a consolation goal for Cork, but it was all damage limitation. Furthermore, had Donaghy’s touch been sharper and Mike Frank Russell spotted fellow sub Darren O’Sullivan unmarked with only Quirke to beat, the margin would have been embarrassingly greater. As it was Kerry’s 13 wides -– to Cork’s six -– was a fair reflection of who owned the ball.

“At halftime I felt we hadn’t played really well,” rued Morgan afterwards. “We weren’t getting the possession in the middle of the field that we thought we should get. We were still only within one score so we felt we were in with a right chance.

“But we got a terrible start to the second half with that goal, which was a bad mistake on our part. And then Kerry’s tails were up and it was very hard to get back at it.”

“A lot of the talk was that Cork would be hungrier for this All-Ireland,” suggested Aidan O’Mahony, who hit the first score of a disappointingly forgettable afternoon. “But I think every one of this Kerry team was prepared to leave everything on the field. It was the first Kerry-Cork final and that meant bragging rights for the next 100 years. So it was a game we couldn’t lose, really.”

Afterwards O’Shea, the fourth manager of the decade to deliver an All-Ireland in his first year as boss, revealed, “As the Kerry team we represent a people, we’re conscious of that every time we go out, whether we go out in a league match or a championship match.

“That’s what I felt myself this year that I had to uphold what had gone before me. We follow in the footsteps of the people that had gone before us. We pass the torch on to the people after us.”

O’Shea also called on the critics to finally give his team the respect he feels they deserve. He added, “They’ve won three out of the last four All-Irelands, they are the first team to go back to back so they’ve proven that they are a little better than just a good team.

“In the modern era with the number of games you are going to have, the amount of competition, the professionalism of most other counties you have to think there’s a reason why going back to back was going to be more difficult.

“Kerry were decisively beaten by Tyrone in 2005, that one defeat separates them from a potential four in a row. It would have been mind boggling for any team to achieve, but this team has put itself up there.”

Kerry captain Declan O’Sullivan is now only the sixth player to receive the Sam Maguire Cup twice, joining Joe Barrett, Jimmy Murray, John Joe O’Reilly, Sean Flanagan, Enda Colleran and Tony Hanahoe in the hall of fame.

In the minor match, Galway staged a remarkable comeback to win the curtain-raiser against Derry. The Ulster champions ran up a six-point lead after 15 minutes but Galway chipped away at the deficit and a very late goal, skillfully taken with great composure by Damien Reddington, saw the young Tribesmen home by 1-10 to 1-9.

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