Keane seeks to add sweet post-script to Kerry reign

28 August 2021. We're into late-stage Covid, a time of modest crowd restrictions at matches and gradually loosening pandemic protocols.

Peter Keane trudges into the Croke Park media room to face the press after what would be his final game as Kerry manager.

Kerry have just blown a glorious chance of reaching an All-Ireland final after conceding three goals against a Tyrone side who were supposed to be ravaged by the after-effects of a Covid outbreak.

It was perhaps the most sickening of all the ambushes Kerry had suffered at the hands of Tyrone, the disappointment intensified by the fact that Dublin had been beaten by Mayo in the other semi-final seven days earlier. In their supporters' eyes, Kerry's well-worn history against Mayo in All-Ireland finals made it feel even more of a fumbled open goal.

Keane, his head bowed slightly, gives a series of curt answers in a quiet voice.

Rarely has a manager looked as despondent and beaten down in a post-match press conference. Completely devoid of stuffing.

On the five-week gap since the Munster final - a consequence of Tyrone's famously daring game of brinkmanship amid their Covid storm - Keane said he didn't want to make excuses, though noted that "you set out with an overall plan at the start of the year and you had to deviate from it".

The Kerry county board chairman Tim Murphy is floating about the place, loitering around the door of the media room.

As Keane slinks away after the mercifully brief press conference, the Kerry local media guys lead the charge over to the somewhat harassed-looking Murphy, the thrust of their questioning being, "So... what happens now?"

Keane ahead of the 2021 semi-final against Tyrone

Within a few days, the wheels are of course in motion. Jack O'Connor, apparently still pencilled in for another season in Kildare, is on the Irish Examiner football podcast.

Before the episode was uploaded, the word had been circulated among the press pack that Jack had "said something significant".

When it appeared, O'Connor is heard talking about the ever present "allure" of the Kerry job and how it's akin to managing Manchester United (why would he want to go near it so, says you).

To outsiders, the comment seems innocuous enough but it's clear to the people in the know that the bat signal has gone up. Like when a Central Bank chief says something vague and the markets go into a frenzy.

Within a few weeks, it's all done and dusted. The assumption that O'Connor was due for a third season in Kildare was wrong. Instead, he's back in Kerry for his third stint in charge, with a remit to win Sam yesterday, if possible.

It was a rough and somewhat undignified exit for Keane, which can't have been made much easier by seeing Kerry haul themselves over the line for a first All-Ireland title in eight years the following July.

Keane wasn't minded to go quietly. He released a spiky 360 word statement, in which he said that "all the players" had expressed their "strong preference for the present management to be retained."

It had all been going so well two years earlier, when Keane's Kerry looked to be on the cusp of scuppering the Dubs' five-in-a-row bid.

Keane, a former Kerry U21 captain, had succeeded Eamonn Fitzmaurice as the county manager after the 2018 championship.

He was appointed largely on the strength of his success with the Kerry minors, guiding them through the victorious final three legs of their five-in-a-row run at the grade - ironically, having succeeded O'Connor in that role.

He had previously managed Killarney Legion to their first Kerry county final in 70 years in 2015, where they were edged out by a point by South Kerry after a replay.

With wunderkind David Clifford having already arrived fully formed as a superstar, Kerry were clearly the nation's best bet to stop Dublin's historic fifth on the spin.

Kerry looked in sleek shape in their gold away strip as they devoured Mayo in the opening Super 8s game in Killarney.

Keane seemed to enjoy inhabiting the role, literally beginning post-match interviews with "yerra" and leaning into the stereotype, as if he was playing the part of a Kerry manager in a John B Keane stage play, while also being the actual Kerry manager.

After the semi-final win over Tyrone, he said goalkeeper Shane Ryan's biggest task was sourcing an extra pair of boots because they'd be worn out from taking so many kickouts in the final.

Kerry had their chance to pull an Offaly and kill the five-in-a-row that September. Jonny Cooper was sent off for wrenching down Clifford's arm in the first half and Kerry nudged a point in front with five to go.

However, Dublin, in Jim Gavin's last year, had more or less perfected the management of the endgame and worked an equaliser for Dean Rock with 14 men. Just under a fortnight later, they won by six to enter the history books.

Still, the future looked bright for Keane and Kerry, though there was some toing andd froing during the subsequent league. Donie Buckley, briefly prised out of Mayo, had spent 2019 in the Kerry set-up but departed in abrupt fashion in March 2020.

Kerry had sidled up alongside Dublin as All-Ireland favourites before the almighty jolt of their first loss to Cork in eight years, the returning Mark Keane becoming a modern day Tadhg Murphy with a last second goal.

Keane earned a reprieve after that setback, the Kerry chiefs perhaps making allowances for the unusual circumstances of the Covid season.

In 2021, everything appeared to be going swimmingly until the unexpected Tyrone sucker punch and that was that. The powers that be in Kerry determined that Keane was out of chances and sent for the uber-pragmatic O'Connor.

Away from the inter-county game, Keane returned to his old post at Legion for the 2023 season, losing the intermediate semi-final to eventual champions Milltown/Castlemaine.

In October, he pitched up in Clare as manager, the seventh Kerryman to take on the role since the mid-1990s.

There are historical antecedents for Keane's situation this weekend.

This Sunday, he finds himself in a similar scenario to his Kerry predecessor Mickey Ned O'Sullivan.

Mickey Ned had the awkward task of succeeding Mick O'Dwyer at the beginning of the 1990s, in one of those rare interludes when Kerry were under Cork's thumb.

Micko's last three seasons over Kerry, in which they lost to Cork every year, were tastefully under-played in the RTE documentary, recently re-broadcast following his death.

"It was the wind-up of that team but they didn't want to let go... they got nowhere to be honest," Micko said of the anti-climactic 1987-89 period.

With the Gods of the golden years entering the twilight of their playing days, Mickey Ned had to usher in a new generation.

Like Keane, he had a degree of success. In 1991, Pat Spillane's final season as a player, they dumped out Cork, then back-to-back All-Ireland champions, in Killarney.

The Munster title, these days a box ticking exercise, has rarely been greeted so cathartically in Kerry.

But it was a false dawn for Kerry's lost generation and disaster would hit the following year. Mickey Ned was designated as the fall-guy after defeat in the most famous Clare-Kerry Munster final of all, a game remembered for an ecstatic Marty Morrissey providing us with his most enduring commentary meme.

Over a decade later, he would return to inter-county managerial paddock with Limerick, taking them agonisingly close to a historic Munster title during a cracking stint in charge.

Mickey Ned O'Sullivan with his Limerick side ahead of the 2010 Munster final

In the 2009 Munster final, All-Ireland favourites Cork squeezed past them 2-06 to 0-11 in Páirc Uí Chaoimh. The following year in a gloriously sunny day in Killarney, they ripped into Kerry in the Munster final.

The suspended Paul Galvin, accompanied by an RTE documentary crew, watched the game from a dimly lit bar in Manhattan before heading away "for a pint with Jay Z" ('Won't be good enough the next day,' was Jay Z's verdict and he was right.)

Leading 0-10 to 0-07, Limerick remained in the hunt in the closing minutes, rampaging midfielder John Galvin lashing home a superb goal in the second half. The reigning All-Ireland champions eventually eked their way over the line by three points.

Mickey Ned's impressive spell in Limerick is a reminder of an era, not that long ago, when even non-traditional Munster finals were competitive.

Keane's first campaign over Clare has been quietly impressive, with five wins from seven which included victories over Kildare and Offaly.

Thanks to a benevolent Munster draw, we know they're bound for the Sam Maguire.

The fact that provincial draws still aren't seeded is a rather stubborn wrinkle in a format where league placing is afforded so much weight. One could nearly interpret it as defiance from the provincial councils in light of the relative dilution of their championships.

We've seen managers turn over their native counties. The late John O'Mahony, removed by Mayo in 1991, returned to haunt them time and again, initially with Leitrim and then with Galway.

John Tobin did likewise against Galway, with Roscommon, in 2001.

Neither represent a shock on the scale that Keane is attempting to execute on Sunday. Given the gulf between the sides, honour would be satisfied by the moral victory of a reasonably narrow loss.

If Clare do manage to leave the GAA world shocked - for the second time in seven days - it would represent a sweet post-script after he was dumped in the most brutal fashion.

Watch a provincial football final double-header, Kerry v Clare (1.45pm) and Mayo v Galway (4pm) on Sunday from 1.15pm. Follow a live blog on rte.ie/sport and the RTÉ News app and listen to Sunday Sport on RTÉ Radio 1.

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