Kerry returned to the All-Ireland senior football championship final with a hard-earned 2-18 to 0-20 win against Dublin at Croke Park this afternoon.

David Clifford (1-5) and Sean O’Brien supplied the goals for the holders who needed a Sean O’Shea point to go in level at half-time before outscoring their old rivals by 1-10 to 0-9 in the second-half to set-up their decider date with Mayo on July 26th.

With just one win in their last eight championship meetings against the capital men, the Kingdom fell behind early on in this semi-final to a Cormac Costello two-point free before surging ahead in the third minute.

Joe O’Connor was adjudged to have been brought down in the square by Peadar O Cofaigh Byrne and the resultant penalty from Clifford was saved by Evan Comeford before the Fossa superstar gathered the rebound and hammered in.

Graham O’Sullivan put two between the sides and Paddy Small would see his first point outweighed by white flags from Paudie Clifford and Dylan Geaney at the other end.

A two-pointer by skipper Con O’Callaghan would be timely for the Dubs as they moved back in front just before half-time with the help of scores from Colm Basquel, Costello and Charlie McMorrow.

O’Shea, a late replace for injured captain Paul Geaney in Kerry’s line-up, made sure the sides went in all square (1-8 to 0-11) at the break prior to Ger Brennan’s men sending over the first three points of the restart via Small, Brian Howard and Basquel.

All that good work was wiped out in an instant however once O’Brien found the net despite the best efforts of Comerford to keep the ball from crossing the goal line.

McMorrow gave the Leinster side back the lead, but Kerry hit the front with a Paudie Clifford two-pointer in the 47th minute and wouldn’t trail again.

David Clifford sailed over another one from beyond the arc for the All-Ireland champions and, after Costello pulled back a point for the Dubs, O’Shea would find his range from distance to have the scoreboard reading 2-15 to 0-16 with a quarter of an hour remaining.

Costello and David Clifford traded points, with Howard and substitute Tomás Kennedy doing likewise prior to Sean Bugler and Nially Scully shooting scores which brought the difference back to a goal with three minutes left.

The next score went the way of the Kingdom though and it was their talisman David Clifford that sent it over to put a seal on his team’s All-Ireland final berth where they’ll renew rivalries with the Westerners in two weeks’ time.

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