All-Ireland SFC Quarter-final/Kerry 3-15 Armagh 1-13: Jack O'Connor sat down in the corner of the Kerry dressingroom amid the light and the banter. The first question drew a smile and got waved off. Did beating Armagh mean the eviction of a monkey from his back? No comment but when Jack was leaving we had a check. No more monkeys on his back. No more rough effin' animals on his case.
Kerry bounce on into the All-Ireland semi-finals taking with them more momentum and more gathered confidence than any other side left standing in the competition. There's no story like a comeback story.
This was an astonishing game, a match that will fascinate and intrigue for a hundred viewings. In the end the jagged twists and turns merely served to inform us of one thing: everything we know is wrong.
Listen. Kerry were riven by rows, the leading dissenters being the boys of the Gaeltacht who weren't taking two bottles into the shower so great was their haste to be gone from the dressingroom after the lost Munster final. Séamus Moynihan was suddenly arthritic with age. Poor Kieran Donaghy was being offered to Francie Bellew as a sacrifice or a snack, whichever Francie preferred. The Gooch had a glittering future behind him and so on and on. The greatest litany of Kerry woes since Peig Sayers began her tale by announcing she had one foot in the grave and the other on the edge.
And Armagh, winners of life's lottery, were carrying a good representation from the Tír na nÓg club and had discovered the secret of the seasons. They weren't committed to improving so much as mellow ripening. They would hustle and they would bustle and their full-forward line would blow Kerry's house down. They would prevail like a force of nature.
At half-time with Armagh leading by two points and good enough value for a lead three times that size we sat in our pews and rubbed our chins and said that all was as we thought it would be. Armagh were about to come out and do cruel things to Kerry.
We had suspected almost from the throw-in that Armagh were just right. The ball squirmed out to John McEntee, who steepled a shot way into the air. As it was falling into Diarmuid Murphy's hands we noted that McEntee's marker, Séamus Moynihan, might be quicker if he used a zimmer frame.
A little while later a bad kick-out from Murphy gifted Ronan Clarke a point and then Kieran McGeeney raked a lovely ball into the hands of Steven McDonnell, who had a generous allotment of space from which to launch his first score of the game.
Sure, sure Kerry came back briefly. Darragh Ó Sé made a fine catch from a kick-out, fed Moynihan, who was cantering again all of a sudden. Moynihan supplied Eoin Brosnan, who spilled the ball and then thumped it on the fly into the Armagh net.
Moynihan was involved in the follow-up point seconds later, scored by Seán O'Sullivan. Then Kerry faded away again.
Armagh kept driving in their familiar fashion. They closed the gap quickly and after 12 minutes we saw Paul Galvin being hounded out over the sideline by Aaron Kernan and it felt like it was 2002 again. Armagh kept driving. Clarke seemed able to do as he wished in front of the Kerry goal. Mainly he wished to supply McDonnell.
McDonnell blasted over a goal chance on 18 minutes but, never mind, soon afterwards he took a break off Clarke and buried it in the Kerry net. Rampant now, he scored the next point to put Armagh four ahead.
A few things were keeping Kerry just about in touch. Donaghy was giving Bellew far more trouble than expected. Not cleaning him out as such but not bending the knee either. He caught a couple of fine balls and broke a few others for points.
It was down to Donaghy that Kerry finished the half so strongly. Balls broken to Colm Cooper led first to a point and then to a goal attempt from Cooper brilliantly saved by Paul Hearty only for Mike Frank Russell to pop the rebound over. Two points in it at the break but Armagh much the more convincing.
Kerry will cherish this second-half performance. They scored 2-10 and made all the right moves. Marc Ó Sé moved out on to Martin O'Rourke, shutting the latter down and scoring two points himself. Donaghy scored the textbook full-forward goal, fielding yet another fine, high pass from Seán O'Sullivan, turning and burying it past Hearty. Kerry thrived. They brought four substitutes on. Each of them scored. One of those perfect days.
Darragh Ó Sé was suddenly majestic. Moynihan omnipotent. There was a glorious little stretch not long after Donaghy's goal where Tomás Ó Sé scored a nice point sandwiched between those two from his brother Marc. It looked just then if Kerry were capable of anything.
Armagh wilted. McGeeney, the dominant influence of the first half, seemed to lose the energy from his legs and began getting tagged in possession.
The Armagh full-forward line was put on rations. At the back, spaces were opening up everywhere. Kerry suddenly looked full of running.
The measure of Kerry's excellence was the final 10 minutes. They were leading by the width of Donaghy's goal when Paul Galvin got involved in some argy-bargy on the sideline and received a second yellow. Kerry switched to a two-man full-forward line and braced themselves. Clarke quickly narrowed the gap to a couple of points. Eight minutes left . . .
Armagh never scored from play in those closing eight minutes. A remarkable thing. We are so used to the courage and patient precision of Armagh's comebacks, so accustomed to their ability to mine a draw and a second chance out of virtually any landscape. On Saturday, though, they were gone.
Substitute Bryan Sheehan kicked a wonderful free from 50 yards to settle Kerry a little. Donaghy moved to midfield leaving Declan O'Sullivan and Cooper inside. Then a terrible and uncharacteristic bit of loose passing let Darren O'Sullivan in behind the Armagh defence. He buried Kerry's third goal of the afternoon, their seventh in a week.
From there it was a formality. The final margin was about right. Kerry are back and the championship is ablaze.
KERRY: D Murphy; M Ó Sé (0-2), M McCarthy, T O'Sullivan; T Ó Sé (0-1), S Moynihan, A O'Mahony; D Ó Sé, T Griffin; S O'Sullivan (0-2), E Brosnan (1-0), P Galvin (0-1); C Cooper (0-3, one free), K Donaghy (1-0), MF Russell (0-2, one free) Subs: Darren O'Sullivan (1-0) for O'Sullivan (52 mins), Declan O'Sullivan (0-1) for Griffin (55 mins), B Sheehan (0-2, frees) for Russell (59 mins), E Fitzmaurice (0-1) for Brosnan (68 mins).
ARMAGH: P Hearty; A Mallon, F Bellew, E McNulty; P Duffy, A Kernan (0-1, free), C McKeever; K McGeeney, P McGrane; M O'Rourke, J McEntee (0-1), M Mackin, S McDonnell (1-5), R Clarke (0-3), O McConville (0-3, frees). Subs: P Loughran for Mackin (46 mins), B Mallon for McEntee (48 mins), P McKeever for O'Rourke (59 mins).
Referee: D Coldrick (Meath).
