KEVIN CASSIDY: The All-Ireland SFC club final had everything

HOW often have I said it? The club championship is the competition that simply just keeps on giving.

We all know how lucky we are in terms of the entertainment the inter-county game provides us with. That said, I don’t think that anyone will argue with me when I say that the club championship trumps the county on all fronts.

What we saw with the club football final last Sunday was absolutely amazing and it had everything you would want in a football game.

Let’s start with the level of football on show. Both of these teams obviously operate at a high level if they made it all the way to the All-Ireland final, but the football they played was simply outstanding.

The game had everything – skill, passion, excitement, mistakes and drama. You name it, those two teams produced it.

It was one of those games that it was severely harsh for either team to lose it, but I suppose that’s the nature of the beast and when you have a game like this there is always going to be one team gowing home brokenhearted.

I watched the game back again and I have to admit that I think that overall Dingle probably deserved the win.

Don’t get me wrong, St Brigid’s will be kicking themselves with a couple of their decisions late on in the contest, but, as a whole, I thought that Dingle perhaps just edged it in terms of opportunities created and opportunities denied at the other end.

When you look at Dingle’s season as a whole, then it has to be one of the most amazing fairytale stories of all time. They looked beaten on so many occasions but they managed to dig themselves out of a hole time and time again. No more so than on the biggest stage of all and the dying seconds of the All-Ireland final.

That win completes a clean sweep for Kerry clubs in terms of club football this season and when you add in the success of the county senior team, then things in Kerry are going pretty well.

All focus will now switch to the inter-county game with the National Leagues getting underway. All of the teams have a few pre-season competition games under their belts so it should be all systems go as competitions get underway on Saturday evening.

Last year and the year before, teams’ approach to the National League would have been based around what type of championship draw they had and when in fact they’re out in the championship. As we saw last year, teams began to take the foot off the pedal towards the end of the league campaign.

At a glance, I fancy Kerry to win Division One again this year for the simple reason that they will embrace those tough games all the way up until the end of the league, whereas the likes of a Donegal or Armagh may have one eye on the Ulster Championship campaign.

Tyrone found themselves in Division Two this year and, although it’s not exactly where they’d like to be, when I look at the table, I think that perhaps themselves and Derry might have too much for what is in that division. They should see themselves bounce straight back up again.

This weekend I’ll make my way to headquarters to cover Meath against Derry and Donegal versus Dublin games in what should be a very enjoyable evening of football. We have heard very little from the Dublin camp since Ger Brennan took over, so I am interested to see what sort of set up and personnel they have at the moment.

Donegal are flying high after the McKenna Cup win and with a lot of talk surrounding the newcomers to the panel. It will also be interesting to see how these lads do on the big stage against the likes of Dublin or Kerry.

All that set aside, it’s absolutely fantastic to have the leagues up and running again and we can look forward to seven or eight weeks of competitive action.