League no place for revenge on Meath says O'Keeffe

NATIONAL FOOTBALL LEAGUE/Focus on Meath-Kerry semi final.  Seán Moran talks to Kerry coach John O'Keeffe about Sunday's game against Meath, who trounced them in last year's All-Ireland semi-final

Although the counties have regularly been thrown together in National Football League play-offs, it is the most recent championship meeting between Kerry and Meath that dominates public consideration of Sunday's Division Two semi-final.

Meath's 15-point mauling of the then All-Ireland champions was the most stunning result of last year's championship, but Kerry's coach John O'Keeffe isn't getting carried away with any talk of vengeance.

"Sunday is not that significant in terms of revenge or anything like that," he says. "Things will be different if we meet during the summer, but in build-up this isn't comparable to championship."

It has been a quiet campaign for Kerry, used to try out a few new faces and marked by a surprising defeat against Limerick. "Limerick played good football on the day," says O'Keeffe, "and were more focused but we showed signs of the stamina work we were doing at the time."

In addition to training programmes, injuries to the forwards have affected Kerry's season so far. John Crowley and Michael Francis Russell have been absent for most of the matches and Liam Hassett's recovery from the knee injury that kept him out of last year's championship is not yet complete.

Even the opportunity to experiment hasn't been particularly useful given that Kerry have spent the League in Division Two.

"You'd prefer to be in Division One," says O'Keeffe. "You get tougher opponents and learn more in the top division. There are times when playing at a lower level can help because players can handle the training and matches more easily. The Kerry public can be very demanding. Doing strength and stamina training and playing good football at the same time is very hard."

Even so, it's been a humdrum campaign for the Munster champions. Losing to Limerick, their first championship opponents next month, was balanced by a good win against divisional winners Armagh but defeat by Louth concluded the season on a downward note.

"Sunday will be a good test," says O'Keeffe. "It's important to do well whether we win or not. Meath tend to be slow starters in the early months of the year. Championship preparation is all about timing, peaking at the right time and Meath are masters of getting that right."

One positive aspect of the season to date has been the calendar-year format. "It's ideal. Counties get a break and there's a clearly defined pre-season. We were able to give players some time off, while before matches before Christmas were meaningless. Training started in November although we gave any of players involved in the international series in Australia time off until after the New Year.

"At this stage matches are beginning to have some meaning. We're playing championship in four weeks and that's our number-one objective. I'd like to win on Sunday and have a second quality match in a fortnight. It'd be an ideal lead-in."

O'Keeffe is also the Ireland manager for autumn's International Rules series. "I won't be starting preparations until the summer but I'm interested in identifying new players who haven't played at international level before. Already there's a few the selectors have been keeping an eye on."