Allianz Football League Division One: Tyrone v Kerry (tomorrow, 2pm, Healy Park, live on TG4)
FILLED with the hues of deflation in Castleblayney last Sunday, the air that was threatening to choke Tyrone has been lifted a bit.
No team is one man alone, but Cathal McShane has become so central to everything they do now that his decision to turn down an AFL contract worth a reported $200,000-a-year to stay home is potentially a complete game-changer.
Tyrone will not suddenly be transformed back into top-end All-Ireland contenders, because right now they’re still missing far too much outside the Leckpatrick man, who could feature from the bench at best in Omagh tomorrow having not trained with the squad up until he made his decision.
The obvious place to start when analysing Kerry is in the full-forward line.
In last year’s All-Ireland semi-final, the Red Hands almost completely shut the Kerry attack out in the first half. For all their riches, the Kingdom had just five points at the break, three of them from frees and one off a Niall Morgan error.
The second half contrasted greatly as Peter Keane altered his team’s shape and went man-to-man. That is how they’re likely to set their stall in Healy Park.
Part of the reasoning is that their inside forward line contains a rejuvenated James O’Donoghue. With David Clifford and Paul Geaney in the trio, Tyrone need three of top-end man-markers in the full-back line to cope.
It’s near certain that Harte will apply the strengths of last year’s semi-final plan. Ronan McNamee, expected to recover from a knock to the head, will take Clifford. Conor Meyler will track Sean O’Shea, if he plays. Kieran McGeary will drop back on Stephen O’Brien.
With Padraig Hampsey and Michael McKernan both absent, Rory Brennan and Hugh Pat McGeary will end up sharing Geaney and O’Donoghue between them. Quite how Tyrone would cope with a Tommy Walsh-shaped curveball, it’s unclear.
Tyrone have an issue in the sweeping role. Colm Cavanagh has been left ever more exposed by Tyrone’s gradual move towards adventure and, operating as a solo sweeper, he has found himself walking a tightrope in games. An early booking in Castleblayney meant he had to stay out of tackles until he was moved to full-forward for the second half.
All day, the gap between Tyrone’s full-back and half-back lines was almost completely unoccupied. Monaghan crucified them in that space.
Frank Burns, the most natural man if they’re looking to bolster the defence, has been operating on the edge of the square himself. Part of why Tyrone had such joy against Kerry in Croke Park was their ability to kick long, diagonal ball into McShane and feed off him. Galway had a rich harvest off it last weekend, creating six goalscoring chances before they were robbed by Paul Geaney’s goal and Killian Spillane’s winner deep in stoppage time.
If Tyrone don’t have that option tomorrow, they’ll struggle to make enough headway.
Peter Harte will have another week’s training under him and with Tom O’Sullivan not having appeared yet this year, Tyrone might find some joy from Harte at half-back and freed of the shackles of Kerry’s stickiest man-marker.
Conn Kilpatrick would be very unfortunate not to start at midfield after an energetic second half against Monaghan, with Kyle Coney pushing into attack and Mark Bradley dropping out because of his suspension, provided it’s upheld.
Kerry haven’t yet had O’Sullivan and were minus regular full-back Tadhg Morley in Tralee last Saturday night. Defensive issues have dogged them over the last few seasons, and it took them until the second half of last year’s All-Ireland semi-final to sort them out.
They will offer Tyrone chances, but then Monaghan did that too. The Red Hands actually had more possession of the ball than their hosts last Sunday, but gave such an astonishing amount of it away that they were flattered by the four-point margin of defeat.
Such performances have happened at least once in most recent campaigns, but the fact they’d also laboured past Meath meant their start was threatening to set off alarms.
Cathal McShane being back will have lifted the mood considerably, but he only solves one issue. The beaten All-Ireland finalists have just too much quality in attack to not punish an understrength and misshapen Tyrone defence.
Kerry by three.
