All-Ireland SFC Final Kerry v Cork:Alan Quirke has the size, skills and experience for the job, writes Seán Moran

You need extraordinary dedication to be a goalkeeper. Injuries are comparatively rare so if you're an understudy the chances are you'll have a long bench life. There's little opportunity to get a run in different positions and you're never asked to go in to vary things in the final quarter.

Cork's Alan Quirke is one of the top players in the position. Just edged out of last year's All Star by Dublin's Stephen Cluxton, he's tall and imposing and uses his size well, whether under dropping ball or stopping shots.

But he's also been around for a long time. This is his second All-Ireland final; he was a panellist back in 1999 when Cork were last involved.

He remained in that role for a further three seasons before career commitments intervened.

"He was sub keeper to Kevin O'Dwyer but he opted out," says his manager Billy Morgan. "He had joined the army [ Quirke is a captain] and was posted abroad but came back in when he returned. He won an All-Ireland junior title and was back on our training panel the same year (2005) but he really came on the scene last year.

"In the McGrath Cup last year he put in some very good performances. Kevin (O'Dwyer) was still there but we had a look at Alan and Paddy O'Shea. Kevin retired but to be fair to Alan he'd already made the position his own before then."

It hasn't been all open road since then; Quirke's season has been hugely disrupted, leading to his missing long stretches of the team's fixture list.

"I've had two injuries this year," he says. "I missed the National League with a hip injury and I got injured in the first round of the championship against Limerick.

"When I got injured against Limerick I thought my season was over but thankfully the management showed confidence in me.

"I have a lot of rehab work done with the help of the backroom teams and the medical staff. As far as I am concerned the injuries are behind me. It will be nearly four months to the day from the time I dislocated my shoulder to the All-Ireland final."

Players in both counties are reluctant to acknowledge the final has added weight because it's between the two most recurrent rivals in football history. In fact Quirke muses that it's an overly parochial conclusion to the All-Ireland: "The fact that it's Cork and Kerry - I'm not sure if that's going to captivate the interest of the whole country."

There is an uneasy background to this final from Cork's point of view in the team's Croke Park record against Kerry. In fact until the semi-final defeat of Meath, Cork had managed, in the last four years, only one satisfactory display at headquarters, the sparkling one against Galway in 2005.

"We spoke about it ourselves," says Quirke, "and how we had not played that well in Croke Park until this year. We got a bit of flak for the Sligo performance, which to my mind was unfair as people did not give Sligo enough credit. But the Meath match was definitely a watershed. If we had lost three semi-finals on the trot it might have been the end of a few lads' careers."

As a former All Star goalkeeper, team manager Morgan is well placed to judge the strengths of his last line of defence.

"He has everything a keeper needs," says Morgan, "a very good shot stopper who covers the goal well and is good one-on-one. His fielding of high balls is excellent. In last year's quarter-final against Donegal when we were a point up it looked like a ball was going over the bar. Most keepers would have pushed it over but he got up and caught it at crossbar height."

Quirke's kicking ability is another important aspect of his game, one that's become a vital component for any modern keeper. Morgan recalls that it wasn't his own forte.

"I could hardly kick the ball as far as the half-back line. I often said to Kevin Jer O'Sullivan (wing back on the 1973 All-Ireland winners) he'd never have been heard of if he'd been playing in front of John Kerins (Cork's keeper in the All-Ireland wins of 1989 and 1990). If a keeper can kick the ball 70 or 80 yards it takes the pressure off the defence."

The man who is hoping to succeed Morgan and Kerins as a Cork All-Ireland-winning goalkeeper says he has benefited appreciably from his manager's experience.

"Certainly he is a huge help. If there are small things, he would point them out to me after matches. He has a brilliant record between club and intercounty All-Irelands."

The torch passes.

Alan Quirke

Club: Valley Rovers

Height: 6ft 4in

Weight: 13st 7lbs

Age: 30

Honours: All-Ireland JFC 2005, Munster SFC 1999, 2002, 2006, NFL 1999, Munster club SFC (with UCC) 1999