Johnno is quoted in the Oirish Times this morning about the team. Now that this organ is free to browse again, here’s the link. If you can’t be arsed clicking on it, here’s what El Jefe says:
Time is what we need with these two [Ronan and T Mort] but I just don’t know if we’ll have enough time. Barry Moran is also very doubtful as he only recently got the cast off the broken bone in his hand. We’ve had two weeks now of preparation, but I watched Tyrone against Westmeath last Saturday, and there’s no doubt they’re a very experienced side.
Oh yes, time’s passage is a bugger, isn’t it? Johnno is old enough to have hummed along with the late Jim Croce in his youth and, seeing as we don’t have any team to mull over yet, I suppose the rest of us might have to resort to doing the same at some point today.
Kerry Vs Monaghan
You have to hand it to the Kerrymen. They are constantly looking at ways to bring the game of Gaelic football on to the next level. The Donaghy strategy effectively ended the Northern dominance and the rest of the country has paid Kerry the greatest respect possible since its introduction. They copied the new blueprint. But the Kerrymen have now seen that the pack is closing in. With a rookie full back and a sweeper, Mayo cracked the code in the league. Cork took a different approach – dominate mid field, starve Donaghy of long ball and then turn the tables on them by deploying their own giant on the edge of the Kerry square. The genie was now truly out of the bottle but on Sunday next I think we will see the next chapter in the development of the Kerry game.
I’m speculating here (as usual) but here’s how I see things panning out.
Gooch is named as centre forward. I don’t expect him to play the normal No 11 role. I think that Kerry will play two orthodox half forwards (O’Sullivan and D Walsh), two full forwards (Donaghy and T Walsh) and Gooch playing between the two lines as the main shooter. He is ideal for this as he is very accurate with both feet from around 35 yards on either side. Sheehan will be withdrawn to play between midfield and the half forward line. This gives two attacking options. Option 1 is to run the ball in using what would now effectively be four half forwards. Playing the ball long is option 2 with two big targets to hit (the twin towers as they are being called in Kerry!). So the line-up would be 1-3-3-2-1-2-1-2, as opposed to the orthodox 1-3-3-2-3-3.
So how do you counter it?
Firstly, Gooch is the key man and the tightest marker needs to be on him. Secondly the match-up between the two big Kerrymen and the appropriate Monaghan men needs to be sorted. Thirdly (and in my view most importantly) Sheenan’s marker should not be drawn out field but should stay in the full back line and play as a sweeper IN FRONT of the 2 big men.
What McEnaney must remember is that Twin Towers can be brought down!
But maybe I’m talking through my arse – we’ll see on Sunday.
It’ll be interesting to see how Sunday’s clash will pan out, alright – The Twin Towers analogy could, indeed, prove an unfortunate one if Banty has done his homework on them!