Tadhg Kennelly felt under more pressure lining out for Kerry in 2009 than he had as a professional footballer in the AFL for a decade beforehand.

Referring to the decision of his fellow countyman Tommy Walsh to return from Down Under to represent the Kingdom in 2015 and the difficulties that transition might present, Kennelly tells The Irish Times:

"My body, I suppose, had almost adapted to being in the AFL and the kicking, I struggled a small bit with my skills components and the game coming back into it.

"The biggest thing is - and I've said this to Tommy - is for people not to put a whole lot of pressure on him. I probably felt in 2009 that it was the most pressurised year of my life, and I'd spent 10 years of playing professional football and I'd felt nowhere near the pressure of an an amateur footballer playing for Kerry - there's your argument, it's crazy stuff. You're dealing with playing in front of 80,000 every week yet the pressure that's put on you here is just immense and I had a lot of sleepless nights that year.

"I think you put a lot of expectation on yourself too, I was a bit different to Tommy, he has a few All-Irelands and I hadn't and I was 29 and I wanted to win one. But there is a big expectation on Gaelic footballers and I think we get a small bit confused with what a soccer player does and a rugby player does in Ireland and we put them in the same bracket. But at the end of the day they've got to rock up on Monday morning and be a butcher, be a postman, be a teacher, whatever it is that you're dealing with the public.

"When you're a professional footballer you're hidden and cocooned from dealing with the public and if you play a poor game you don't have to front up Monday morning in front of them."

As for the role Walsh might play next season, Kennelly adds:

"I'd see it as highly unlikely that you'd see him playing at full forward, for me I think he's got the running capabilities of anyone now. I think he'd probably outrun Donnchadh Walsh who's probably Kerry's fittest player. He's just a beast of a man.

"You will probably see him anywhere from centre back to midfield to on the 40, for me he could easily be out and about and because of his size he'd be the biggest man in the competition by a long shot."

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