All-Ireland Senior Football Final

[TheManFromFerbane]

Well lads\lassies, (incidentally, how many lassies do we have here?) how do we see this one playing out. If Cork were called Team A and Kerry were called Team B you'd have to fancy Team A big time but I just don't know.

No matter how many times Cork beat Kerry in Munster and no matter how well they do it, they just can't get the result in Croker. Cork have been coming along perfectly ticking all the boxes, big athletic players who can play ball. They got over two games that the could\should have lost (Kerry\Limerick) and now they seem to be really stretching their legs.

Kerry on the other hand seem to have only papered over the cracks with their result against Dublin, a team that is renowned for caving under the weight of expectation once they get one knock outside of Leinster, apart from that they have been just scraping through every game they've played, which, even though is a good sign in a team usually, I'm just not convinced about.

Unfortunately, I'm definitely not expecting the cracker of a game we got in the hurling, I think one team will win this game handy enough, problem is I'm not exactly sure which! I'm gonna go with my head and say Cork by 4-5 but my gut is rumbling!

[DD]

Kerry by 3 or 4 with Donaghy playing a vital 20 or so minutes..

[Georgio1]

Good man DD, well called. Donaghy did well when he came on but was not vital. Great Kerry performance, and they are now one of the greatest (if not the greatest) team of all time. So many great performances, but everyone of them chipping in with a contribution. Keeper probably the most valuable member of the team over the course of the year.

[bracknaghboy]

Another fake All-Ireland final. Kerry were beaten months ago and that should have been it for them....back to club football. But instead they play a few poor teams in the much loved qualifier system and progress to and win another All-Ireland. Whats wrong with people that can't see how how utterly flawed this system is? When you have people commenting that teams "might be better taking the qualifier route" then surely that itself is proof that the system is wrong.

[Bord na Mona man]

Great Kerry performance, and they are now one of the greatest (if not the greatest) team of all time.

A very good team no doubt, but the fact that they weren't good enough to beat Tyrone on every occasion they met this decade has to stand against any claims of greatness.
A big factor in Kerry's last 4 All Ireland wins was their opposition (Cork and Mayo) wilting on the big day. Which isn't Kerry's fault of course. However that they now routinely lose in Munster and don't put a stamp of brilliance on a championship in the way Kilkenny do means I don't consider them an all time great team.

As for the match. Cork looked a beaten docket after half an hour, even though they were very much in it on the scoreboard. It was surely a game that needed Michael Cussen to be thrown in at full forward to try and bypass Kerry's swarm defence once they decided to sit back and defend their lead.

Kerry won the game in the spell after the goal when they completely dominated around the middle and pinned Cork back in their own half. Cork had lost their nerve by the end of this and their shooting went to the dogs.

[naasmanxrhode]

What does NAMA stand for in Cork.






NO ALLIRELAND MEDALS AGAIN

[Georgio1]

Fair enough point BNM. However while noone disputes that Kilkenny are greatness personified in hurling, they have done it at a time when Leinster is in a terrible state, and Munster is such a minefield. Galway have not been a force they once were either.
In football the point that Kerry have not beaten Tyrone is a negative, but I would also say that Tyrone have been one of the great teams also. Very little to seperate them, but I feel for longevity and the brilliant individual displays, at this ultra competitve time, Kerry will be regarded as a great team.
Also, we all felt going into yesterday that Cork could win, but Kerry never pnicked and strangled Cork, long before the end. The fact that they have won leagues along the way only serves to back up their claim to greatness.
I think Tyrone are one of the finest drilled/coached teams and Kerry have such an abundance of talent throughout the team/panel. They have also developed a hardness which makes them even more difficult to beat. Great or not I suppose is difficult to define but imo this Kerry outfit have been one of truly great teams.

[Lone Shark]

It's hard to look at that Kerry team and say that they are truly great, since they simply don't impress you. Their brilliance in the quarter final was obvious, but in every other game this year they've just stuck it out and limped over the line. On the one hand you could argue that they were comfortable yesterday, but on the other they failed to ever really put Cork away, despite Cork putting in a truly pitiful display, on the field and on the line. (I thought the game was crying out for Cussen to be brought on, to only do it with five minutes left and then to bring him on at midfield? Utter madness.)

The old adage that you can only beat what is put in front of you holds true, but the great Kerry teams of the seventies and eighties were defined by their rivalry with Dublin while this team's only real rival is Tyrone - a team that has beaten them well on all three meetings.

They stayed standing longer than anyone else and thus are the deserved champions, but I just can't have them over Tyrone myself. Certainly not in the same bracket as this Kilkenny team who are the greatest hurling team ever.

[Veteran]

The football final was a serious let down all right, I got the impression that Cork never believed they could win and were nearly waiting for Kerry to put them out of their misery so they could tip back down to the Lee and bemoan the qualifier system and agree that everyone hates Cork and that they still are the best hurling and football team in the country.

On the point of Kerry's 'greatness' it is a hard one to call. The facts are that this team has won five all ireland titles since 2000, including back-to-back wins a couple of years ago. In the modern day that is a fair achievement (I think that the last team to win back-to-back championships was Cork in '89, '90) and one that Tyrone couldn't match, However Kerry's failure to get the better of Tyrone in the three encounters does suggest that they are flawed. Another point to consider though is that this Kerry team redefined modern day football a couple of years ago by re-introducing a big man at full forward and thus bypassing a lot of the negative tactics that teams were starting to employ - in a sense they made football interesting again.

Maybe this team may cannot be deemed truly great but there is little doubt that they have truly great players who have stood the test of time over the last decade.....Gooch, the O'Shea's and Paul Galvin in particular. They can't win all irelands like Kilkenny but in fairness, the Cats have raised the bar and then raised it again - in fact who ever won all irelands like this Kilkenny team????

[Lone Shark]

I think one thing which has to count against Kerry as well is that they have taken huge advantage of the backdoor system. While nobody could blame them for playing the system as it stands and it does mean that they've had to win a lot more games en route, I think it's fair to say that I don't think qualifier wins over Longford, Sligo and Antrim are hurdles that would have tripped up the great Kerry teams of the 70s and 80s. Essentially this Kerry team has been beaten most years and still they managed to pick up All Irelands anyway.

Also, was it just me or would Sunday's match have been hugely encouraging for a lot of counties out there? Obviously Offaly still has a long way to go, but if you were a county like Kildare, Meath, Monaghan, Derry or some such, you'd have to look at that Kerry team and say that the bar isn't as high as all that.

[The Magpie]

Some things support the argument that this is a great Kerry team, while some go against - of course, the difficulty is how to measure something so subjective?

I think the answer to that question is to look at the only true information that's available to us and do the Maths.

The number of All-Ireland Final appearances. 8 in 10 years.
The number of All-Ireland Final wins. 5 out of 8 finals.
The number of games lost. I don't know the answer to this. An educated guess would say Kerry have lost no more than 10 games in 10 years. They must have played 50+
The number of important games lost. Only 5. The 5 that prevented them from winning more All-Irelands. Munster final defeats are of no consequence, if Kerry go on to win the All-Ireland.
The number of winners All-Ireland Medals across the Kerry team. Some are already at 5. Darragh has one more. There's certainly a lot of winners medals there. I don't have the number, but somebody will.

Things that cannot be measured.

The quality of opposition - I myself talk about the cheap All-Irelands that Kerry have won, but in any final, they beat (on form) the next best team that was left in the Championship!
The current standard of Gaelic Football - We'll almost always believe football was better in the past.
The get-out-of-jail free card - If the theory about the qualifiers is to be believed (that stronger teams have a greater chance of winning an All-Ireland), surely it's more probable that Kerry have faced the stronger teams at the latter end of the championship?

Anyway, if somebody has the time and the patience, compare the numbers we do have to the numbers available from other 'great' teams. This team will be right up there.

[Bord na Mona man]

On paper Kerry's record is undoubtedly great.
They're the most successful team since that Kerry side that Pat Spillane won all the All Irelands for.

However, since there existed a team that they weren't good enough to beat every time they met, its hard to put them on a pedestal.
My opinion is that Tyrone at their best were/are better than Kerry at their best.
Granted Tyrone play a style of football that is hard to sustain year-on-year and in their lean years they lose to lesser lights than Kerry would. However Tyrone still hit the higher tide marks in the last decade.

[Bord na Mona man]

Also, was it just me or would Sunday's match have been hugely encouraging for a lot of counties out there? Obviously Offaly still has a long way to go, but if you were a county like Kildare, Meath, Monaghan, Derry or some such, you'd have to look at that Kerry team and say that the bar isn't as high as all that.

The biggest source of hope is the aging profile of Kerry. Most of the players from 1-9 are around or over the 30 mark.
While they might have a conveyor belt, you don't replace immediately replace 4 or 5 players around the same area of the field without some pain.

With Tyrone tending to yo-yo, there is definite scope for a team to snatch an All Ireland from under the radar like Galway did in '98.

[TheManFromFerbane]

For me they are the best team of the decade. No doubt about it. To be the best team you have to compare yourself against the second best team. I'm sure we'd all agree that it's between Tyrone and Kerry and if you do that match up the numbers all add up for Kerry.

Are Tyrone their Achilles heal? Most definitely. But to use a soccer analogy (because it's the only one I can think of) Would the Wimbledon team of the late 80s/90s be considered a better team than that Liverpool team just because they used to get results against them on a fairly regular basis? No, definitely not, and it's the same for Tyrone and Kerry.

The second argument on whether they're one of the greatest teams ever? It is a different ball game now, this backdoor system has changed things. If we are to say that the Kerry team of the 80s is the team they are being compared against well then you would have to ask "Would the 00 team have gone as many games unbeaten and won as many titles in this decade if there was no back door?" and the simple answer is, we'll never know. It's very hard to compare apples with oranges. Ulster wasn't as strong back in the 80s because of the troubles so who's to say the 80s Kerry team would have done as well in the 00s.

[Bord na Mona man]

The Wimbledon analogy is slightly different because Wimbledon would never actually outplay Liverpool.
Tyrone's performance in the 2005 All Ireland final, or the first half vs Kerry in 2003 is something that I don't believe Kerry could ever match.
A lot of the begrudging complaints about swarming tactics may have distracted people from the reality that Tyrone continually outplayed Kerry.

Another sporting analogy is Ronnie O'Sullivan vs Stephen Hendry.
Pit O'Sullivan at his best against Hendry at his best and you'd pick Ronnie to win.
Hendry won more world titles by being more solid and consistent. Same as Kerry.

Or in the 90s in hurling, Kilkenny were on paper more successful than Offaly. Yet Offaly put in a performance of hurling mastery in the '95 Leinster final that was beyond the abilities of that Kilkenny team. But if you solely count the stats, Kilkenny were the greatest hurling team of the 90s.