Target practice over the first 30 minutes, old fashioned stonewalling throughout the second half and with that Meath shunted themselves into another league semi-final.
Just before the game, a number of fans rushed a set of metal gates in an effort to escape a venomous rainshower. Wonder was that the Kerry fans didn't storm the exit routes 15 minutes into the match, so hapless were their players.
Meath fired themselves into a 0-6 to 0-1 lead after 10 minutes, marking with typical tightness and kicking points with admirable surefootedness. Kerry, meanwhile, could not have looked more inept. They trailed 0-13 to 0-3 at the break and it wasn't even that close.
"The lead we built in the first half was crucial to us and, in fairness, the lads took scores which there was really very little any defender could do about. I wish I could say some of those moves were planned but the ball just ran for us," said Sean Boylan afterwards. "We knew at the half-time it would be a matter of protecting the advantage and Kerry really did take the game to us after that. But that one score we got in the second half was a huge point and, thankfully, it was enough."
The omens were ominous for Kerry from the outset. Sluggish on the breaking ball, they resembled a team labouring in the middle of a heavyduty training programme and just couldn't cope with Meath's sharpness. With an abundance of possession, Meath wasted little time in amassing scores, Jim McGuinness whipping a point in the first minute and triggering off a flurry of point-taking.
The impressive Ray McGee added a second from a free and then Nestor fed McGuinness again who popped his second.
After that, Kerry just slipped timidly from contention and were woefully indecisive on their rare forays forward. Yet for all that, they might have ended the half with a couple of goals on the board.
After seven minutes, Dara O Se plucked a clean ball from centrefield and threaded a pass for Gerard Murphy, who hooked a point when a low shot seemed like the inevitable conclusion.
Then, seven minutes before the break, Billy O'Shea spun into acres of space but rapped his shot wide even as the Kerry contingent began to hope. They were down 0-11 to 0-2 at this stage - all the Meath front six split the posts over that first half. Dara O Cinneide hammered over a welcome free with four minutes remaining but it was Meath who retired on a high note, Jody Devine nailing a point before McDermott nonchalantly blasted the last score of the half from centre-field.
Although Kerry did eventually engineer a brief period of pressure, orchestrated mainly by the bullish determination of the excellent Seamus Moynihan, it began too late and yielded too little. Maurice Fitzgerald, keenly marshalled by Darren Fay, scrambled Kerry's fourth point after 40 minutes and then they began to string together a few cohesive moves; Liam Hassett played John McGlynn, who chipped a score; O Cinneide punished a foul on Fitzgerald.
Moynihan charged through three solid tackles to set up a free which O Cinneide again nailed. Down 0-8 to 0-13 with 13 minutes remaining, a Kerry reprieve seemed halfway plausible.
Doggedly, they maintained the chase, with substitute Aodan Mac Gearailt chipping a pass for the on-song O Cinneide to finish once more. Then, after 51 minutes Moynihan ventured forward again and fisted another Kerry point to leave just three between them.
Although a downfield wind did have a significant bearing on matters, Boylan seemed concerned at how utterly his team had dried up and fired in the replacements. It did the trick; Meath broke up field, Graham Geraghty misfired but his errant lob fell for Ollie Murphy who blasted his side's only second-half point on the turn. With three minutes left, it would be enough. And afterwards, the main talking point was the rain. No harm if this one gets lost in the archives.
MEATH: C O'Sullivan; M O'Reilly, D Fay, C Murphy; P Reynolds, H Treanor, D Curtis; J McDermott (0-1), N Nestor; J McGuinness (0-2), J Devine (0-1), G Geraghty (0-1); R McGee (0-4, 3 frees), N Crawford (0-2), O Murphy (0-3, 2 frees). Subs: R Keally for J Devine (52 mins), E Kelly for N Nestor (51 mins).
KERRY: D O'Keeffe; K Burns, B O'Shea, E Fitzmaurice; S Moynihan (0-1), L Flaherty, E Breen; D O Se, D Daly; B O'Shea, L Hassett, J McGlynn (0-2); G Murphy (0-1), M Fitzgerald (0- 1), D O Cinneide (05, 3 frees). Subs: T O Se for B O'Shea (21 mins, inj), A McGearailt for B O'Shea (37 mins), P O'Sullivan for L Hassett (49 mins).
Referee: B Crowe (Cavan).
