By John Harrington

Kerry manager, Jack O’Connor, was delighted with the control his team played with in the second half of today’s Allianz Football League Final against Mayo.

The Kingdom were the better team from start to finish but O’Connor was most pleased with how his team improved the longer the game went on.

“I’d say it was an enjoyable game to watch, it was a bit helter-skelter game, end to end and we felt in the first half it was a bit too helter-skelter for our benefit because we were turning over a lot of ball up in the forwards and Mayo were counter attacking us,” he said.

“We tried to calm things down at half time and make sure we didn’t lose ball up in the forward line because Mayo were getting oxygen from our looseness up front. But very happy any day you kick 3-19 in Croke Park is a great day.

Despite the excellence of today’s performance, O’Connor says he still has an open mind as to what his strongest starting XV is ahead of the Munster Championship.

“Hard to know. We’re back in Fitzgerald stadium now next week to get ready for championship. That’s what will dictate who starts the Cork game. We never have any pre-ordained notions about who starts and who doesn’t start.

“We’re getting players back, which is good. Gavin White came back and played 50 minutes, Seanie (O’Shea) and David Moran were at the tail end of the panel today so we are getting players back.

“The likes of Paul Murphy isn’t a million miles away, Stefan (Okunbor) should get the all-clear next week. We’re getting our full panel back. It just makes for good competition in training. That will dictates who starts and finishes games.”