February 17, 2011
By Staff Reporter
Until last weekend it’s been the lesser lights taking centre stage but on Saturday, Kerry sprung from their slumber and just in time too, as Galway came to awaken the west. In the end the champions came through 1-21 to 1-16 winners in conditions not seen since Hurricane Charlie grumpily made his way to the capital in August of 1986 and that caused an apocalyptic downpour that resulted in a closure of exits at the back of the Hogan Stand due to knee-high water on Jones’s Road. And while the win keeps Kerry’s three-in-a-row ambitions very real, it confirmed their status as the single greatest team of the modern era. Perhaps the greatest of them all based on pure quality, and the road travelled to win their All Irelands.
“Kerry were brilliant today,” said Galway manager Liam Sammon paying tribute to easily the best performance of the season. “They just proved what a great team they are. Any team that is going for three-in-a-row deserves the respect and plaudits that they get. I felt at one stage when we got the goal that if we had pressed forward and gotten a point or two more, we might have gone ahead. But that is the sign of a great team – any time they are under pressure that they are able to come back and score. Any team that beats Kerry will win the All Ireland, that’s for sure.”
Sammon is not wrong and can take huge credit for a debut year that not only brought a Connacht title but helped produce this classic. Going toe-to-toe seemed foolish yet Galway rocked the champions with some early blows, all of which came courtesy of Michael Meehan. In all the Man of the Match kicked 10 points, five from play, and when Joe Bergin netted with a high fist midway through the second half, the shock was on. But you can’t keep a good thing down and with the crown slipping Kerry came to life when trailing by two points. They kicked six unanswered points in a 10-minute period and for the second time in a week came back from the edge. But while the Monaghan win was a rock-breaking exercise, this was far more poetic as they picked off sniper’s points down the stretch to emerge relatively comfortably.
What made it even more startling was this was done courtesy of the supposed poor relations. Darragh