We need to talk about Kieran.
Or maybe we need to talk about Kerry and their relationship with their current captain.
In last week’s thrilling draw with Cork, the former Player of the Year was involved in several key incidents in the game, but got his hands on clean possession only three times in the entire match.
Three.
His goal; a looped run when he gave a fist-pass to Johnny Buckley to score a point after 18 minutes, and the third occasion when he scooped up Colm O’Neill’s ’45 attempt that dropped short after 71 minutes.
Looking at the game, initially, you’d say that Donaghy was not as influential as he should have been, and that Kerry needed more from their talismanic full-forward.
Maybe Kieran Donaghy needed more from Kerry.
Eamon Fitzmaurice will be looking at his side this week and at who to drop, and who to bring in, and there’s no doubt Donaghy’s head will be on the block.
Indeed this article was initially about why Kerry needed unequivocally to bench him, as I felt he had performed poorly.
But, looking back at the game, Kerry just didn’t use their best attacking weapon against a massed defence as they possibly could have, despite the forward putting in his usual lung-bursting efforts.
Kerry went through phases of aiming the ball at Donaghy and then forgetting about him entirely.
From the throw in, they aimed a ball at the full-forward line into no-man’s land, the next ball was a high one into the full-forward that was well defended.
Donaghy’s first possession in the entire game was after 12 minutes when Johnny Buckley robbed Michael Shields and ‘Star’ was there to tap home.
After that, a ball aimed at him in the 22nd minute resulted in a knock-down that sucked Paul Kerrigan into a black card.
Despite years of playing against him, Cork still struggled, and even breaking ball from him didn’t always work.
He is a unique weapon for Kerry, but the Kingdom’s supply lines simply did not see him as a consistently viable option to overcome the sweeper system they faced.
He is not just ‘lump it into the air’ merchant either.
With so many Cork bodies behind the ball, Kerry needed to pick out the right ball for ‘Star’ but failed to do so even when given the option.
Contrast that with Donegal or Dublin, who know that almost every ball they will aim to their full-forward line will stick, thanks to Michael Murphy or Paddy McBrearty or Dean Rock and Bernard Brogan.
Instead, Kerry ran into a wall of red and coughed up possession instead of targeting Donaghy, who was often left one-on-one at the edge of the square. It must have been massively frustrating for the Austin Stacks man.
Kerry’s half forward line poses little to no threat in terms of scoring unless they are inside 20-metres.
Full of hard running but little quality in terms of troubling the scoreboard.
It is left to the three inside forwards to cover the spread of six .
It’s a bit like having a music band but only two lads can sing. The others are there to do the heavy lifting and move around a bit but we all know who carries the harmonies.
And if Kerry want their attack to sing then they need to start playing smart and more direct against the double sweeper system of Cork.
That means making space for Donaghy and committing men forward to pick up scraps.
Not easy when there is nine and ten Cork people behind the ball. But it is possible.
With all the Cork players around they still couldn’t prevent Donaghy getting a touch to the ball and Donnchadh Walsh popping over a point.
It was the same for the penalty, and the chance created by Paul Geaney’s Garryowen that resulted in a costly missed ’45 by O’Donoghue
Cork’s second half performance was down to destroying Kerry at midfield and not their blanket defence.
They launched attack after attack because Kerry conceded, and then kicked ball straight to the returning Alan O’Connor 30 seconds later, who scattered Kerry players like skittles every time he attacked.
When Kerry won possession back and kicked long they did what Pat Spillane always advocates-the best way to get around a blanket is to go over it.
The point scored by Colm Cooper – which was one of two clean possessions he secured in the game – was a result of a wonderful forty yard kick pass from Marc O Sé.
Donaghy was simply starved of possession and his influence waned as a result.
Cork are not Donegal. They forced some turnovers in the first half but after the break it was all about midfield and blasting Kerry away through grunt down the middle.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PwwKNh6Lz0g
Kerry blitzed Cork last year by winning the midfield battle and then giving it to James O’Donoghue, who kicked 0-12.
Donaghy was on the bench then and was an unused sub in the All-Ireland Q-final win over Galway.
Kerry had found a way to win without him because Anthony Maher and Bryan Sheehan were winning oceans of possession and supplying O’Donoghue and Paul Geaney with lovely ball hopping into their chest.
However when things went south against Mayo he was called on to the savior and repaid the Kingdom boss in spades, and goals.
Kerry won’t always need Donaghy to win games.
If the Kingdom don’t want to use him as an attacking weapon then Eamon Fiztmaurice is perfectly right to drop him.
It may even see a restoration of Colm Cooper to the full-forward line.
But being dropped for the replay will not be because Donaghy is not effective anymore.
He is.
He was involved in six key plays last week. No other Kerry player came close to his influence. He did all he could.
But he may still have to watch the replay on the bench
If he is dropped, it is not for a lack of ability but because Kerry have simply forgotten or don’t want to use their best weapon to breach a blanket defence anymore.
Fitzmaurice trusts his half-forward line to be able to punch holes better than his veteran full-forward.
For his sake and that of the Kerry captain, he will be hoping that gamble pays off.
