Jason Foley has heard all the criticism at this stage – and become an expert at ignoring it.
He’s part of a Kerry defence that isn’t strong enough to win the All-Ireland, many have claimed.
Another barb consistently thrown at Kerry is that they’re too young to win really big after upgrading a large number of ex-minor stars.
Foley is one of them himself having powered Kerry to underage success in 2015 and made his senior debut against Clare in 2018.
Kerry’s concession rate throughout 2018 alarmed their supporters and leaking another three goals in the recent Munster final prompted more criticism.
Foley said: “Yeah, I suppose it is hard to block all out of it, you do hear certain snippets of what people are saying. Look, no team likes conceding a couple of goals in a game and we’re no different.
“It’s something we are working on at the moment in training but I don’t think we need anyone else to tell us that we have things to work on.
“We know that ourselves and once we know, we’ll certainly work as hard as we can to put whatever frailties exist right. Personally, I think we are in good stead, we learned a lot from the Munster championship.”
The Ballydonoghue man hasn’t got much time for claims that they’re too young either.
He insisted: “You won’t be given a Kerry jersey if you’re not ready. We are all in this dressing-room on merit and you know you have to leave the jersey in a better place.”
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