Kerry's second banana ripe for Croke Park redemption
And who, more than anyone else, navigated the group away from the rocks.
'The younger players worshipped him,' Fitzmaurice wrote of Declan O'Sullivan during Kerry's 2014 campaign. 'Declan challenged the group to the core. He said that if we didn't rise our standards and play as we should be playing, he would cross the street to avoid meeting lads in the future. He outlined how he wouldn't be able to look people in the eye if they didn't do the bare minimum - giving it absolutely 100% with a Kerry jersey on their backs, and to never ever give up.'
The final of that year was O'Sullivan's last stand, and he was barely able to do so. His knees were mangled but he finished with his son and Sam Maguire in each hand after victory over Donegal.
For that Kerry No 11, read the current No 11 in terms of leadership and inspiring respect and the giant-sized hole unfilled when he's absent.
Just shy of the tenth minute in Killarney on Saturday, a moment. Cavan's Sean McEvoy cuts back inside for the dish off to Padraig Faulkner. The wing back is coasting mentally and on his blind side, a train is approaching. A train robber. Kerry's second banana. Sean O'Shea effects the steal, sets Joe O'Connor on his road. The Stacks man is in behind cover off the stand side of Fitzgerald Stadium but leaves the kill to Gavin White at the back stick. This circle isn't closed. White hit the outside of the post when he should have goaled, but the point remains – Kerry, with Sean O'Shea running their offence, are a different beast.
'Every time I watched Meath coming out with the ball in Tullamore, all I could think of was a forward who wasn't even on the pitch,' remarked one ex-All-Ireland winner on Monday. 'Seanie would have been in everyone's ear, and if they weren't pressing and tackling, they'd be getting a short, sharp reminder.'
'Seanie is the spiritual leader of that group, no doubt about it,' manager Jack O'Connor reflected after Saturday's win. 'We seriously missed him last week in Tullamore. He doesn't just play well himself, he gets other fellas around him to play well.'
In coming to terms with the pile of problems Kerry have ahead of their All-Ireland SFC knockout against Armagh, one must balance considerations with the return of Paudie Clifford and O'Shea in particular.
"Look, Seánie has been a serious leader, not only this year but in years gone by,' explains Gavin White. 'He's one of the best players in the country and a serious leader on and off the pitch. To have him on the pitch was a huge bonus and that showed with the performance that he put in. Last week, he did his best when he wasn't playing to try to motivate fellas on the line, which shows the character that he is. He's a serious player for us to have on the pitch and we're very grateful that he was able to make it back from injury at a crucial stage of the campaign."
Kerry will need him. The likelihood is that Paudie Clifford will start in the half forward line, shifting Joe O'Connor back to midfield. O'Shea, Clifford and Graham O'Sullivan will need to put in an epic shift in the most difficult line on the pitch. The campaign has not been kind to Kerry's half forward options, from the loss of Cillian Burke to the AFL, to the retirements of Stephen O'Brien and Adrian Spillane and injuries to Dara Moynihan and now Tony Brosnan. That's quite the collateral damage.
Said White: "I said a couple of weeks ago at the launch of the Munster Championship that the new rules were going to have a serious impact on injuries. We seem to be impacted an awful lot this year, I don't know what other teams are like. In both games against Cork we picked up a lot of injuries. I think we had three substitutes in the first half in the second game. Look, it's just the next man in. That will be the same this week even though Diarmuid (O'Connor) is a big leader for us. If he doesn't make it back for next weekend, he'll certainly be a loss. But we'll go out and try to put in a performance for him."
O'Connor's campaign looks done. It may be that he has shoulder surgery now to stabilise that area and prep him for spring 2026. Any back of a fag box list of the quintet that Kerry could ill-afford to lose would include the Na Gaeil midfielder.
It will be Tuesday before Jack O'Connor's management team is able to properly compute who's fit and able for Armagh. Saturday was all about putting the shocker in Tullamore to bed.
"It was a mixed bag, I suppose,' reflected White. 'I think the main thing was that we got a result, maybe fixed a couple things from Meath and just look forward to a quarter-final now in Croke Park. That was the be all and end all – just get to Croke Park and see how we go from there.
"We were very disappointed in the way we played in Tullamore. It was hard to put your finger on exactly what happened. It was a complete malfunction from everyone all over the pitch. We were disappointed individually and as a team. But the main thing is that we were still in the Championship and we still had a chance to rectify it and put on a performance to try to get the win."
Manager Jack O'Connor and talisman David Clifford used their post match media engagements to speak directly to the Kerry faithful with essentially the same message: get on board with us now, please.
'We got a bit frantic at times, and made poor decisions with the ball up front,' O'Connor lamented, 'and we forced it a bit. There are times when you need to take the sting out of the game, and just work it. Then other times you can go route one.
'But that's understandable, because confidence mightn't have been what it should have been after last week. It's very important to kill the ball in the modern game. Giving the ball away is a no-no because, if you kill it, you have a 50 per cent chance of getting the kick-out back.
'It was good to get Seanie back in, and Paudie Clifford too, because they're the men that drive the rest of them. We'll gather the troops during the week. Obviously there'll be a bit of doom and gloom around with the injuries and all the rest of it, but the lads are very determined to give it a good cut next weekend.'
Cavan's Paddy Lynch did all he could to further Kerry's discomfort on Saturday, and as things got tight in the last quarter in Killarney, they became feisty. Cavan and David Clifford's jersey had a running dispute and when Killian Spillane was upscuttled with seven minutes remaining, a Kerry train ploughed in to plant a Cavan man in the back.
Setting standards and putting down markers.
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