PAT O'SHEA sauntered into the media room, embodying the Kiplingesque virtues urged by the sponsors Vodafone's advertisement. But if the Kerry manager, a month after dealing with disaster in Cork, was treating triumph just the same there was no doubt which he preferred.

Monaghan gave Kerry a searching examination but the champions roll on to next weekend's quarter-finals.

"At certain times," said O'Shea, "you're going to have to weather the storm and at sometimes you're going to have to make hay when you have the ball. We probably showed a little bit of rustiness in the first half - a bit slow in our options, blocked down quite a lot, which was unfortunate, but we still had the cool heads when it mattered. You can't put a price on winning tight games.

"This team has been on the road for many years. We talked about that and we talked about the success of the team over the past number of years and how that can take it toll. Hunger has always been an issue for this team and it continues to be but I think today we showed the necessary hunger to win tight games.

"The middle third of the pitch is the most crucial area in football and it gave us a fierce platform to get ball into our inside line. We probably didn't take enough advantage of it when we dominated but we can work on things over the next couple of days."

The most tangible difference between the sides was the 58th-minute goal cracked in by Kieran Donaghy whose manager paid tribute to his full forward.

"Yeah. The old cliche is that goals win games. We were two up at the time so any score was going to be quite good and quite important so the goal coming as it was, was a good move. Eoin Brosnan was instrumental in it and it looked like he was going to pull the trigger on a few occasions but he had the presence of mind to pick out Kieran.

"Kieran's six foot five and people talk about him catching big, high balls but he has finesse and skills and kicked 1-2. He's proving himself a real, quality player."

Donaghy himself was characteristically unfazed by the demands of the occasion and paid tribute to his erstwhile centrefield partner Darragh Ó Sé, who yesterday equalled the record for championship appearances and will break it in next Saturday's match against Galway.

"I'm delighted for him playing his 70th game," said Donaghy, "delighted he gets another chance to come up next week. Credit to the man. I'm there suffering from cramp on the sideline in the 73rd minute and he's pulling balls from underneath the cross bar. He's just a war horse and it's a privilege to play with him."

For Monaghan manager Séamus McEnaney the anguish was worse than last year when it took a last-minute point to put Kerry clear of his team.

"We believed coming up here we could win the game. We believed at half-time - there's a serious trust there between myself, the management and the group of players - that we'd pull this one out of the fire. We got our chances, didn't take them - very, very disappointing. Twice as bad as it was last year. I've only had a few minutes to myself. We performed very well but didn't get across the line.

"We weren't working hard enough, weren't putting in enough tackles and we were giving Kerry too much room in around the middle third of the field.

"They were putting in too much easy ball and building from the half-back line up. We addressed those few issues at half-time. We took the game to Kerry and had plenty of chances to win."

Four years in charge of the team, he was inevitably asked about his future plans and whether he felt able to take the team any farther.

"I gave this job four years of my life. I've a young family at home and a lot of business in Monaghan. I'm quite a busy man. I've given it four years and I'll take a couple of weeks to decide. The county board has given us everything. Everybody was rowing this boat with me."

But once again the boat ran ashore on familiar rocks. Yesterday was the fifth time that Kerry have defeated Monaghan in the All-Ireland series and McEnaney ruefully reflected on the fact. "It looks like every time we come with a good team Kerry's in the road. We came in the 70s and Kerry was in our road. We came with a good team in the 80s and Kerry was in our road and we've come with a good team in the 2000s and Kerry's in our road but the reality is that Kerry's in everybody's road."