Last week I played golf with a few retired Kerry footballers. The conversation ebbed and flowed like it always does when you’re golfing but I’d say if you were handed a recording of it, you’d find that the majority of our day was taken up with chat about Kerry playing Cork in this Sunday’s Munster final.
There’s plenty to talk about. Kerry’s injuries might be clearing up, or they might not. Bouncing back from the league final hammering isn’t a certainty either. Cork are back in Division One and probably in better shape now than they’ve been for years. Even just the fact that it’s a Kerry v Cork Munster final in Killarney. We haven’t had that since Covid time, when you could get only 2,500 into the ground.
So this is a proper Munster final. Or at least it felt like one before Monday lunchtime, when the draw came out for the All-Ireland series. Boom! Kerry v Donegal in Killarney in three weeks. So much for Kerry v Cork.
Jack O’Connor is 100 per cent right in what he said on Monday. Having a draw as consequential as that in the week when two provincial finals are happening sucks the life out of them. Kerry v Cork and Galway v Roscommon are on this weekend, but once the big draw was made, nobody was talking about those games.
READ MORE
It’s not just Kerry v Donegal, either. Cork v Meath is a huge game for both those teams. They know they can beat each other. They’ve had two games already this year and they’ve both won one, with only a kick of a ball in it both times. And Roscommon have their best shot in years at a Connacht title, but it’s totally overshadowed by Tyrone coming to town a fortnight later.
I know putting these fixtures together is never as simple as people like to make out. The explanation for the draws being done this early is that it gives the county boards more time to get themselves organised and get the logistics sorted.
But surely to God they could have done the draw in two parts – one next Monday for the four teams playing this weekend and one the following Monday after the Ulster and Leinster finals had been played. That way, everybody has a fortnight to get ready for their next game and every province can have a decent build-up to their final.
There’s another issue, too. The way it is now, you’re nearly punishing teams for getting to their provincial final. Donegal, Meath, Tyrone and Kildare all got knocked out of their provinces early, but now they get three weeks to study their opponents, including a full-bore, all-cards-on-the-table provincial final in the middle of it.
Jim McGuinness and his Donegal staff will be in Killarney on Sunday – they won’t need anyone hiding in a tree this time either. You can be damn sure that Robbie Brennan will be there too, just like Malachy O’Rourke and Brian Flanagan will be in the Hyde. Same with the Ulster and Leinster finals the following week. It’s a small enough thing, but it all adds up.
Nobody is going to be taking a dive in a provincial final. The cup is sitting there on the steps of the main stand – you’re better off ending your day holding it up rather than watching the other crowd’s captain making a speech. That’s definitely the case in Kerry. The only thing to do when a Cork team is on the rise is to put a stop to it before they get any notions. They can’t be let win a Munster final in Killarney.
So in an odd sort of way, there’s pressure on them coming into this game. Kerry won a brilliant All-Ireland last year. They lost their midfield, found a completely new one and still kept trucking. That means the Kerry people are looking at the team now and going, “Well, sure, haven’t we a load more players than we thought this time last year, so we can’t be crying about injuries.”
I would say that’s why Jack came back for another go at it. He hasn’t won back-to-back All-Irelands and he knows that if Kerry can get everybody right, there’s a back-to-back to be won with this group. Something like that brings its own pressures.
That’s why you’ll see Kerry going full-bore after it on Sunday. People can come up with all the theories they like about the new structure and why it’s actually clever to lose a game here or there to give yourself a handier route, but it’s all nonsense. My attitude to it would be to go out and try to win every game and not get into this carry-on of resting players or anything like that.
Because the reality is that this is all going to be over and done with very quickly. We’re in the thick of it now. Eight weeks from now, the championship will be down to the last four teams. By then, most people won’t remember a thing about when draws were made or what games became overshadowed.
Every defeat is bad news. Let’s say Kerry lose to Cork on Sunday and then a fortnight later, Donegal come to town and beat them again. Technically speaking, they’ll be in exactly the same place as they are today, still in the All-Ireland and in with the same chance as everybody else of winning it. But you can’t be losing two games in a fortnight at home and be confident of going back-to-back. That’s not in the plan.
So none of the talk matters this week. Injuries don’t matter, the Donegal game doesn’t matter, the Cork crowd coming to Killarney doesn’t matter. Kerry have a Munster final to win.
Provincial finals might be devalued, but some things in life are non-negotiable.
