Dubs stick with same XV for weekend clash

Dublin manager Pat Gilroy has decided to stick with the same team that saw off Donegal for this Sunday’s All-Ireland final showdown with Kerry.

There had been some concerns over the fitness of wing-forward Paul Flynn but the Fingallians clubman has been selected at No 10. Rory O’Carroll also lines out at full-back despite leaving the semi-final win over Donegal with a hip injury.

Gilroy’s team are all making their All-Ireland final debut, while their opponents Kerry are packed with players with multiple Celtic Crosses in their back pockets but the manager has a lot of experience of Gaelic football’s showpiece, as he told the Evening Herald this week."Between the club and the county, this would be my fifth All-Ireland," he explained.

"Three of them, I could say, the preparation was perfect and we won two of them. One of them (the 1992 final), from the players' perspective wasn't good. We got caught up in the fun and all that sort of stuff and it just didn't help our performance on the day.

"The other three I was involved in, they were very much the way you should prepare for a final. So I suppose I saw both sides of it."

DUBLIN (v Kerry): Stephen Cluxton, Cian O'Sullivan, Rory O'Carroll, Michael Fitzsimons, James McCarthy, Ger Brennan, Kevin Nolan, Denis Bastick, Michael Darragh Macauley, Paul Flynn, Barry Cahill, Bryan Cullen, Alan Brogan, Diarmuid Connolly, Bernard Brogan.