Allianz Football League Division one, round one
Kerry 1-18 Donegal 0-23
THIRTEEN days after they were first supposed to meet in Killarney, Donegal beat Kerry to make it two wins from two in Allianz Football League Division One.
The deserved two-point win over Jack O’Connor’ side was also the county’s footballers first-ever success in Fitzgerald Stadium, with their only other win over the Kingdom coming in Tralee in 1988.
Ryan McHugh led the way for the visitors on the day, scoring the first-ever two-pointer in the county of Kerry in the fifth minute of the match. That came just a minute after Jim McGuinness was forced into an early change, with an injury to Michael Langan seeing Paddy McBrearty introduced.
Read more:
- Kerry v Donegal: Ulster champions Donegal grab historic win in Killarney against Division One rivals
McGuinness was hugely satisfied to come home with the points.
“You are putting pressure on yourself to get points on the board early. They worked hard and the ebb and flow of the new rules kicked in there for periods, we were in control then Kerry came very hard at us, they got the goal.”
“A wee bit like last weekend, they weathered the storm and kicked important scores at important times. You would prefer not to be in that situation but I don’t know if that’s going to be a reality for any team moving forward.
“It is going to be like the hurling model where teams have energy in the game and you are pinned and then there’s more energy. To me, that is the way it feels.
“But we are all learning, we are moving forward and I know the FRC are meeting this weekend again and taking the learnings from the first two weekends, so we will see what comes from that, but it makes the journey up the road far shorter.’’
Kerry boss Jack O’Connor was not too downbeat about the result.
“It was obvious that Donegal were a fair bit ahead of us, sharpness-wise and maybe fitness-wise and, you know, there were times when it look like they had a run on us, but in fairness to our fellas I felt we battled well in the game.
“We possibly could have got something out of it. I would say in many ways we played better than we did last Sunday, without getting anything out of the game.
“It’s well known we’re missing some players at the moment, but we’re getting a great shift out of the lads we have and are exposing a lot of fellas to this level of football, so hopefully our panel will be stronger,” he said.
Donegal started well and were four points to the good inside the opening seven minutes. Kerry didn’t score until the 11th minute through Dylan Geaney, but by the 21st minute the same player had levelled the game at 0-5 each. That was as close as Kerry were to get.
McBrearty put Donegal back in front with a two-point free in the 25th minute and they went on to lead by 0-11 to 0-7 at half-time.
Kerry got back to within a point early in the second half but found themselves trailing by six (0-17 to 0-11) after 46 minutes when McHugh put further points on the board.
Crucially, the visitors kept a slightly misfiring Kerry forward line at bay long enough to cope with a late rally from the hosts. Substitute Paul Geaney threatened an impact as big as the one in Derry the previous Sunday, playing the ball across to Diarmuid O’Connor for the only goal of the game in the 61st minute to cut Donegal’s advantage down to one (0-20 to 1-16). However, a late point from substitute Jamie Brennan was the insurance score for the visitors.
Kerry only managed one two-pointer, from Sean O’Shea, on a day when Donegal got three.
Both sides are now two games into a five-week run of games, with Donegal welcoming All-Ireland champions Armagh to Ballybofey next Sunday, a day after Kerry host Dublin in Tralee.
Kerry S Ryan; D Bourke, J Foley, T O’Sullivan 0-1; G O’Sullivan 0-1, T Morley, S O’Brien; D O’Connor 1-1, BD O’Sullivan 0-1; P Clifford 0-2, S O’Shea 0-5 (0-2f, 1tp), C Trant; C Geaney 0-3 (0-2f), D O’Sullivan, D Geaney 0-3
Subs Mike Breen for T Morley (30), R Murphy for C Trant (H/T), P Geaney for D O’Sullivan, C Ó Beaglaoich 0-1 for BD O’Sullivan (both 50) and K Spillane for C Geaney (59)
Donegal S Patton; F Roarty, B McCoole, P Mogan 0-1; R McHugh 0-5 (1tp), EB Gallagher 0-1, C Moore 0-1; M Langan, C Thompson 0-2; D Ó Baoill, C O’Donnell 0-3, S O’Donnell 0-2; H McFadden, O Gallen 0-3 (1tp), C McGonagle
Subs P McBrearty 0-3 (1tpf) for M Langan (inj, 4), J Brennan 0-2 for H McFadden (50), E McHugh for D Ó Baoill (58), M Curran for R McHugh (60), O Doherty for O Gallen (67)
Referee B Cawley (Kildare)
