KEVIN CASSIDY: Kicking the January blues

FIRSTLY, I’d like to wish you all a Happy New Year. I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas, but as January hits it’s all about getting back into routine and getting the bodies right again after a few weeks of overindulgence.

Luckily for us, there is plenty of football to get our teeth into at this time of year.

Let’s start with the club scene. I don’t think too many people would have predicted this year’s All-Ireland Club final pairing, not least myself. Dingle and St Brigid’s will contest this year’s final, and I’d be confident in saying that those two teams wouldn’t have featured heavily in conversations around potential All-Ireland contenders a number of months back.

I think that’s why this competition is so special. If we compare it to the All-Ireland Senior Football Championship, you could probably predict who might challenge for Sam, but this competition throws up surprise after surprise.

Take Dingle for example – we’re all well aware of the talented players they have in their ranks, but early talk in Kerry was all about the formidable Dr Crokes team, and look how that championship ended up.

With club football, you just never know, and I think that adds to the drama of the competition. Dingle did unbelievably well on a number of occasions to claw their way back, but Ballyboden will be sick that they didn’t kill the game off. In the other semi-final, I don’t think Scotstown got to the pitch of the game, or at least played anywhere near their capabilities, and when you do that against a very good St Brigid’s side, you’re always going to be up against it.

It should make for a cracking final, and it’s one I’m really looking forward to.

This weekend I’ll make my way to headquarters on Sunday to cover the Junior and Intermediate Club finals for TG4.

We have a Kerry team in both finals, with Ballymacelligott facing Clogher from Tyrone in the Junior final, and An Ghaeltacht contesting the Intermediate final against Glenullin from Derry.

Kerry football is riding a wave this year, with teams in the junior, intermediate and senior finals. Add in their dominance at county level, and it makes for a great season for the Kingdom.

As the club season reaches its summit, the inter-county season is up and running again. The weather played havoc with last weekend’s games, but this week we should get a clearer run of things. I think it’s great that these games are back and open to the public, because if they weren’t happening, teams would be playing challenge games behind closed doors anyway. It’s good to see the pre-season competitions reintroduced.

On top of the club action and pre-season inter-county matches, we also have the Sigerson Cup in full swing. Going from having no football to having the pick of it is great for us as we try to battle our way through the January blues.