Kerry minors stroll past Kildare at Semple Stadium

KERRY 2-15 KILDARE 1-8

Jack O'Connor is relishing the prospect of Kerry's double date with Mayo at Croke Park on August 24th. Former senior manager O'Connor has masterminded the Kingdom's march to the Electric Ireland All-Ireland minor semi-finals.

“I am delighted with our lads, they have answered every question that has been asked of them this year,” said O’Connor.

“It is fantastic to be looking forward to a double-header in Croke Park in three weeks.”

Kerry’s winning margin yesterday, in front of 2,527 Semple Stadium spectators, was a comfortable ten points.

But Shea Ryan's goal with 10 minutes remaining had brought Kildare to within four.

That was the cue for Kerry to step on the gas and it was Tomas Ó Sé a champion Irish dancer, who netted a brilliant 53rd minute goal. He fetched Brian Rayle's free, powered past two defenders and fired a brilliant strike past Tadhg Foley.

Ó Sé hit 1-2 in a spell that saw Kerry register 1-4 without reply and O’Connor reflected: “Tomás is a big, strong lad. He actually didn’t tog out for the last fortnight. He had a bit of a knock.

“We thought the edge might be gone of him, but he proved today he was doing a bit of dancing at home to keep fit!”

Struggling

Kildare, despite showing some fight, were always struggling after Michael Kelly was sent off for a second bookable offence in the 48th minute.

Kildare had also lost Seán Healy to a black card before half-time and they were fortunate not to have one or two more players suffer a similar fate.

Kerry also suffered black card woe of their own when Micheál Burns, who had scored three points, was dismissed in the 38th minute.

By half-time, Kerry were 1-7 to 0-4 clear and they dominated the second quarter of the game.

Jordan Kiely netted in the 14th minute after leading scorer Killian Spillane created the opening by showing real strength cutting in along the endline.

KERRY: S Ryan (0-1, 45); C Coffey, B Ó Béaglaoich, T O'Sullivan; D O'Donoghue, A Barry, B Sugrue; B O'Sullivan (0-1), M O'Connor; M Flaherty, L Carey (0-2), M Burns (0-3); J Kiely (1-0), K Spillane (0-6, five frees), T Ó Sé (1-2). Subs: B Rayle for Burns (b/c, 38 mins), L Kearney for O'Connor (42 mins), R Wharton for Sugrue (49 mins), S O'Sullivan for Carey (53 mins), I Parker for Kiely (58 mins), J Foley for O'Donoghue (58 mins).
KILDARE: T Foley; S Healy, M Hyland, A Scully; J Flynn, P Mescal, S Ryan (1-0); R Feely, C Kavanagh; E Flynn, C Hartley (0-1), S Lawlor; B McCormack (0-3, one free), S Dempsey (0-2, free, 45), A McConville. Subs: J Healy for S Healy (b/c 29 mins), P Murray for Lawlor (30 mins), M Kelly (0-1) for McConville (30 mins), E O'Donoghue (0-1) for McCormack (42 mins), M Bursey for Feely (56 mins)
Referee: N Cullen (Fermanagh).