Under-20 rule benefits the rich and hurts the poor

Niall McIntyre

The Kerry under-20s are down a few men this year.

But aren’t they better off? The main purpose of underage competitions should be to develop youngsters so that they’ll make better seniors when their time comes.

Of course, it’s brilliant for a county to win an All-Ireland minor or a provincial under-21 championship but really, it shouldn’t be all about the glory here. The end goal for a county should be to have as many potential senior stars graduating from their underage ranks when all is said and done.

If manager Jack O’Connor had David Clifford and Sean O’Shea at his disposal for this campaign, then the Kingdom’s under-20s would be hotter favourites than they already are to win this tournament outright.

But David Clifford and Sean O’Shea are good enough to play for the Kerry seniors already. They’ve shown that up along the ages and they showed it when given the chance in the National League this year.

And now that two of Kerry’s best players aren’t playing in this competition, other players are given the chance to prove themselves as future green and gold heroes.

But where Kerry will survive and indeed prosper, other counties, like the Limerick team they played on Friday night are worse off. One of a number of drawbacks to this competition, weaker counties like Limerick simply don’t have the strength in depth to replace their best players who can’t play because they’ve played for their county’s seniors.

On Friday night, they were minus their key man Josh Ryan. On top of it being slightly undermining of the under-20 competition to have the best players absent, it is also a shame to the players who are deprived of the memories of playing with the friends and teammates they grew up with and played alongside up along.

As well, it’s hardly encouraging for the lads who are still there to be on the end of 28 point defeats like Limerick were against Kerry. That’s an easy way for lads to lose interest in the game.

For Kerry, however, this couldn’t be much better. Fiachra Clifford and Donal O’Sullivan continued the explosive progress they’ve been making, both firing four from play. The performance of full back Stefan Okunbar also caught the eye, with Kerry folk getting extremely excited about his future prospects.

On this solemn day June 14th 2018 and with Royalty in the Kingdom – I predict that Stefan Okunbar will be the next Kerry senior fullback and will go onto to as great as Johnno or Seanie Walsh – he is athletic – marks from the front – great hands – can climb high into air #Mystic

— Mortimer Murphy (@MortimerMurphy1) June 14, 2018

Powerful and aggressive, Okunbar has all the hallmarks of a soaring full back.

The Na Gaeil club man’s ascendancy in the green and gold is hardly surprising given he featured extremely prominently in last year’s AFL draft recruitment programme athletic performance tests.

The Kerryman had the 8th fasted 20 metre sprint of all the youngsters tested, and also scored highly in the agility tests.