National Football League, Division 1: Dublin 0-19 Kerry 1-15
With Kerry and Dublin, the old rules will always apply. Even on a cold windy night in February there were traces of summer in the madness. The convulsions that shaped the outcome, though, were rooted in football’s momentous new beginning. Dublin trailed by 12 points coming up to the break, but with an adrenalin rush of two pointers in the last five minutes they flipped the game on its head and sent their travelling supporters into raptures. Even in February.
It was Dublin’s first league win here since 1982 and for three-quarters of the game nothing of the sort looked likely. One of the powerful trends in the early rounds of the league, though, is that the borders of unassailable leads are being re-drawn. In the new scoring system, the kind of double-digit scoreboard swings that have electrified hurling for years have migrated to football.
Luke Breathnach scored the match winning point with three minutes remaining but another of Dublin’s substitutes, Lorcan O’Dell, blew the game apart. In the space of three minutes, he kicked a pair of two-pointers that wiped out Kerry’s four-point advantage. With elite teams, going down the stretch in football with an arms-length lead used to be a recipe for keep-ball and clock-watching and inevitable outcomes, but all bets are off now.
“Once you can work shooters into those positions the two pointers are on all the time,” said Jack O’Connor. “Ten point leads now aren’t safe anymore.”
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Just like Dublin in the first half, Kerry couldn’t generate much penetration against the wind and, in total, only seven points were kicked into Horan’s End. Dublin kicked four of them. At half-time that didn’t look it would make any difference. That was old thinking.
“It was challenging at half-time,” said Dessie Farrell. “But we just asked them to give it everything and throw the kitchen sink at it. There was nothing to lose at that point. Even if we didn’t get the result - which is a bit of a bonus - I was just very pleased with that effort in the second half, the bit of bottle that the lads showed.
One of the spin-off consequences of the new rules is that nobody can guess yet what a wind is worth, certainly not within a pollster’s margin of error. It was blowing so fiercely towards the Mitchell’s End that Kerry made four attempts at two pointers in the first half, three of which hit the target and the other led to a goal. But it still felt like they had been conservative in their kicking.
Kerry led by 1-12 to 0-4 at the break though the goal only came after they had failed to capitalise on four other chances, two of which just needed a moment of clarity and a simple lateral pass.
“The goal chances were there for us,” said O’Connor. “There was one where there was a man free at the back post. He could have headed it in. That was one and we had a couple of other one-on-ones, but look it was a bit of a lottery with the strength of the wind. It was hard to get the ball up the field.
“It was hard to win a kick out because the ball was holding up against the wind. I think we were 10 out of 19 in the second half which I suppose is average enough, but it was a telling factor because Dublin kept coming.”
Dublin had the same problem in the first half and of their 13 kick-outs against the wind they won just six. Making his first appearance in the Dublin goal since the league final last year, Evan Comerford was under pressure from the beginning.
In another rule tweak that was communicated to the counties last week, Comerford was penalised for dawdling too long on a kick out; under the new rules, it resulted in a 14-metre free. For Kerry’s goal, three minutes before the break, he left his line to contest a dropping ball when it would have been wiser to delegate. When the ball broke to Paul Geaney he finished to an empty net.
Dublin made a fast start to the second half and when the excellent Sean Bugler kicked his third point Kerry’s lead had been more than halved by the end of the third quarter. O’Connor lamented Kerry’s inability to hold on to possession longer when they did get the ball into Dublin’s half and there was a critical 18-minute period during Dublin’s surge when Kerry failed to score.
A two-pointer from Ciaran Kilkenny brought the deficit down to a goal with 12 minutes left and every outcome was on the table now. Kerry sprung David Clifford from the bench for his first appearance of the season but they struggled to feed him close to goal.
Kerry’s last score was a beautifully flighted kick from Paudie Clifford, but there were still nine minutes to go. Insurance scores come at a different premium now.
Kerry: S Ryan, D Bourke, J Foley, T O’Sullivan, G O’Sullivan (0-0-1), M Breen (0-1-0), B Ó Beaglaoich, D O’Connor, J O’Connor, P Clifford (0-0-1), S O’Shea (0-2-3, 2f), D Lyne, C Geaney (0-0-1), P Geaney (1-0-1, 1 mark), M Burns (0-0-2). Subs: D Casey for O’Sullivan, 8 mins; C O Beaglaoich for Lyne, 47 mins; A Heinrich for B O Beaglaoich, 48 mins; D Clifford for C Geaney, 51 mins; K Evans for Burns, 59 mins; S O’Brien for J O’Connor 65 mins.
Dublin: E Comerford, D Byrne, T Clancy, S McMahon, B Howard, C Murphy, G McEneaney (0-0-2), T Lahiff (0-0-1), A Gavin, K Lahiff, S Bugler (0-0-4, 1 free), C Kilkenny (0-1-1), N Scully, E O’Donnell (0-0-1), S Lowry. Subs: Lee Gannon (0-1-0) for McEneaney, h-t; L Breathnach (0-0-2) for Lowry 45 mins; L O’Dell (0-2-0) for K Lahiff, 53 mins; N O’Callaghan for O’Donnell, 58 mins; D Keogh for Gannon, 63 mins.
Referee: L Devenney (Mayo).
