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Colm Cooper, on his return to championship against Tipperary in the semi-final of the Munster Championship last June. Photo by Gavin O’Connor.
WINTERS are colder and longer in Kerry when Sam hasn’t be claimed in September.
This unwelcome occurrence brings with it a time of introspection among Kerry football people and Colm Cooper is no different.
The Gooch, coming back from injury, admits he was slow to get moving, but was happy with his form coming into the All-Ireland Final defeat to Dublin.
“I struggled in the early part of the year to get to the pace of it but all of a sudden, come the start of July, I started getting sharp again really quickly,” said Cooper.
The 32-year-old, eight time All-Star was speaking while on a tour of Down schools in his capacity as AIB youth ambassador.
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“So the disappointing thing for me was how did that not really translate onto the pitch in Croke Park, which is strange, because at times like that before I have gone out and played very well in final. This is probably the one and only time that this has happened.”
“There are finals when I hadn’t performed great, but I hadn’t felt good going into them. But I felt really good going into this one, and it just didn’t happen for whatever reason. I know I am better than that performance. I know there is still more in the body.
“Sometimes you have to go away and do a little bit of soul-searching. That’s just the way it goes.”
He also spoke about his disappointment that players in the All-Ireland Final were not told that they would be heard on a referee’s microphone for an RTE documentary.
The ‘All-Ireland Final’ documentary aired last week featured audio and footage of players speaking with final referee, David Coldrick, during the match.
“In the heat of the moment players can come out with anything and you don’t want to be portrayed as something that you’re not. Obviously David Coldrick knew about it. He was very cool, calm and collected, but the players weren’t as cool.”
