Amid all the chatter about Dublin's disorientating supremacy over Kerry, one statistic leaps out a mile.
We're all indebted to a texter from Off the Ball from pointing us in its direction. Dublin, the texter said, had outscored Kerry 5-20 to 0-8 in the final ten minutes of the last five 'big games' the pair had played in Croke Park.
NOTE: Cahair O'Kane of the Irish News informs us that he tweeted out similar stats last Friday evening.
@ballsdotie ? pic.twitter.com/pFxtrUj8bA
— Cahair O'Kane (@CahairOKane1) August 29, 2016
Naturally, the immediate thought on this end was that Kevin McManamon alone accounted for about 4-16 of that total. But we decided to check it out ourselves.
The five games are the four major championship games the teams have played since 2011 - the 2011 final, 2013 semi-final, 2015 final, 2016 semi-final - and this year's League final.
Casting our eyes back to the various minute-by-minute accounts of the Dublin-Kerry games of the last five years, as well as the video footage of every match, all of which is happily preserved on youtube, we came up with a scoreline of 'Dublin 5-17 Kerry 0-8' from the 60th minute onwards in every game.
2011 Final
Kerry led 1-8 to 0-9 on the 60th minute, immediately clipping over another couple of points through Colm Cooper. From this unpromising position, Dublin rustled up 1-3 with Kerry's only remaining score coming from a skied but brilliantly hit Kieran Donaghy point.
Last ten - Dublin 1-3 Kerry 0-3
2013 Semi-Final
Dublin had nosed in front after 60 minutes, leading a thrill-ride of a match, 1-16 to 3-9. Kerry scored two points and led right up until the final couple of minutes.
The Dubs hit 2-2 in no time at all, the second goal coming through Eoghan O'Gara with the second last strike of the game - Dean Rock felt obliged to punch it in to leave the score in little doubt after it banged off the crossbar - polishing off the game. As Malachy Clerkin famously wrote after the match - "if you could sue a scoreline for libel, Kerry would win millions'.
Last ten - Dublin 2-2 Kerry 0-2
2015 Final
The dreariest of the recent championship encounters between the two by several miles, and the one which offered the least for the neutrals.
At 60 minutes, following a truckload of Dublin wides, Kerry were still clinging on, trailing 0-10 to 0-8. Paul Flynn kicked a point immediately into the final ten and Alan Brogan added another in the dying minutes.
Last ten - Dublin 0-2 Kerry 0-1
2016 League final
The most lopsided final ten minutes in the decade of matches between the two sides. Kerry had gamely kept in touch with the Dubs before crumbling horribly in the final ten minutes.
Coming on top of the definitive loss in September, a match in which Kerry were flattered to only go down by three points, this convinced many that the Dubs were close to unbeatable.
Paul Flynn and Eric Lowndes blasted in goals to really put the hurt on Kerry.
Last ten - Dublin 2-3 Kerry 0-0
2016 All-Ireland semi-final
On the 60th minute yesterday, Dublin trailed Kerry 2-12 to 0-15 following a James O'Donoghue score. While the next Dublin point was quickly followed by a beautiful swerved Paul Murphy point, the Dubs then took off, winning the remainder of the game 0-6 to 0-1, coming especially strong in injury time.
Last ten - Dublin 0-7 Kerry 0-2
