David Moran says that Kerry have no need to send him an SOS despite being short of midfield options.
Moran announced his retirement from inter-county football last January, leaving a gaping hole in the Kerry engine room with Joe O’Connor’s 2023 season having been ended before it started following a cruciate knee ligament injury last September, while manager Jack O’Connor’s options were reduced further when Stefan Okunbor was sidelined for the rest of the campaign in March.
The Kerry boss hasn’t been averse to bringing players out of retirement in the past, most notably with Mike McCarthy and Eoin Brosnan, and Moran was still in fine form for Kerins O’Rahillys right up to January’s All-Ireland club semi-final. But, according to Moran, there was no call this time and he insists that he’s happy with the decision he made almost six months ago now.
"I met with Jack, we thrashed it out and he just asked was there a bit more in me,” the 35-year-old explained.
“You know, at the end of the day, it wasn't a fully football decision. We had a young baby and a second one on the way in February, busy at work, which I was keen to really get behind. He did say to me unless you were 100% in here at your age it's not going to work.
“I just weighed it up. You think of the best-case scenarios and as much as I'd love to be in the Hogan Stand on the day of the All-Ireland final, it's not as simple as just fast-forwarding to that. There's an awful lot of work that has to go in and there's a lot of ups and downs.
“Last year, I was very lucky with injuries. I managed to keep injury-free and obviously I haven't a great history of that. I'm 35 this year, was I going to physically compete?
“I need to be on the training field and when I weighed it up I just wasn't sure I was going to be able to do everything.
“Something was going to fall down and was it ok for family to fall down or work fall down or football to fall down and suffer?
“On balance, it was just the right decision for me and will I have regrets if Kerry go on and win the All-Ireland? I don't think I'll have regrets.
“I'll be delighted and of course you'd love to be there but you can't do everything.”
Their perceived shortcomings in midfield were a talking point in the run-up to the recent All-Ireland quarter-final win over Tyrone, and so Diarmuid O’Connor’s man of the match display alongside Jack Barry was timely with formidable Derry pair Conor Glass and Brendan Rogers next up on Sunday.
“He is very good, he is very athletic. He is a really good lad, he works very hard, he is a great teammate and a lot of guys would have been saying it is only a matter of when really.
“Whether he is going to be much better than he was the last day, I don’t know. We have to see if he can do it again and again and again, that’s the key. The level he hit the last day was so high that is probably enough.
“And it is very difficult because you are coming in midfield as a young guy, the reality of life is that nobody is coming in at 19,20, 21 at midfield and dominating, it just has not happened across all the best midfielders in the other counties, even they have not done it.
“Diarmuid is at a good age coming in, he is obviously very comfortable with Jack Barry and I know that Jack is very easy to play with, he is a fantastic player.
“There is good camaraderie there and as a Kerry supporter now I am hoping we will have a repeat of what happened the last day.”
