We've been in this room before and we no doubt will again. Jim Gavin and Stephen Cluxton come in and take their seat and to look at them, you'd swear they were coming straight from a day in court. Kerry have been put away in Croke Park for the fifth time in a row, with a fourth league title on the bounce tucked away too. Yet there's no histrionics, no bubbling over. Process, process, process.
Four leagues in a row has only been done twice before. For consistency alone in an era when league football has never been more competitive, it must feel like an achievement to rank up there with anything they’ve done. Or, maybe not.
“No, championship is championship and league is league,” says Gavin. “Pre-season is pre-season and there’s a definite hierarchy there. We look at the league as the third competition. You have the league, the provincial series and the championship series. We’re representing our county and just want to be the best that we can be in every competition we play and if there’s things to be won along the way we’ll take them. But it’s all about that process of trying to be our best and the outcome of that is the four leagues.”
This game was Dublin’s everywhere but on the scoreboard for long spells but once Aidan O’Mahony walked on 50 minutes, there was always a chance it would get out of hand. And so it proved.
“There’s no doubt it had an impact. That game was as close to championship pitch as you’ll get. When you lose a man you’re immediately under stress. There’s spaces being opened up that can be exploited by the opposition.
“That said, I thought we were beginning to get some control on the game at that particular point. We had created a lot of opportunities up to that stage, didn’t execute them that well. I thought we were beginning to get a foothold but there’s no doubt it did impact on Kerry’s performance.”
Eamonn Fitzmaurice’s contention that Kieran Donaghy had a lot to put up with in front of the Dublin goal is put to Gavin, but he isn’t biting.
“I thought our defence copes admirably with him. He is a very big player, very talented footballer, not easily watched. If you take your eye off Kieran he will punish you. I thought our defence played a very fair game, we were very disciplined in our tackling.”
Pebble
Before leaving, he has one pebble he wants to get out of his shoes. Some of his players missed out on the big Laochra show because they were below-stairs being drug tested. He wasn’t happy.
“We all fully support the initiative [dope testing]. We don’t want cheats in our game that’s the first thing to say about it. But I think it could be better managed. You have amateur players immediately after games, it’s not appropriate. They all want to enjoy the success or deal with losing a game and I think the last thing they need is somebody coming down and having an invasive procedure taking place.
“There is plenty of time during the week of a game to pop out to us or immediately afterwards. Every team has some recovery protocol on the day after a game so there is plenty of opportunity to get your samples if you need them.
“But even today we had four players there – Laochra was taking place outside and they’re in the dungeons of the stadium being closed off and not having access to the entertainment. It did not just sit right with me. They are the athletes that people came to watch today and for them to be treated that way, I don’t think was appropriate.
