Colm “Gooch” Cooper, the man who had been disciplined during the week, came on in the second half to settle Kerry’s nerves and score some vital frees to help give the Kingdom a hard earned victory over Antrim in their All-Ireland football fourth round qualifier at O'Connor Park, Tullamore yesterday.

The victory means that Kerry will now contest the All-Ireland quarter-final at Croke Park this coming weekend but for long periods yesterday it was looking bleak for them as Antrim led their lofty opponents for long periods, at one stage by a two points margin.

In fact Kerry looked totally at odds with themselves in the first half and were inept when it came to kicking in close in frees and it was only a question of time before manager Jack O'Connor called on the services of Cooper to try and correct this obvious handicap.

So with five minutes to go to half-time O'Connor sent Cooper into the action as a replacement for Sean O'Sullivan and while he did not get a chance to show his skill until the second period he proved to be Kerry's saviour, not alone kicking points from frees but also had a hand in a number of other defence splitting raids.

Later he also drafted in Tomas O Se, another player who was disciplined for breaking training and the man who has played 65 times for the county was not in the starting team yesterday but he too came into the fray and played a leading role in the defence.

Afterwards O'Connor was asked about Cooper's influence when he came on and also about the controversy surrounding the disciplining of the Killarney ace and the Gaeltacht clubman because of breaking training discipline.

This controversy put new pressures on Kerry yesterday but while the team struggled badly in the first half and for long periods in the second O'Connor said that he did not feel any extra pressure on him because of the publicity surrounding the discipline of Cooper and O Se.

”Believe it or not I did not feel any extra pressure,” said O’Connor.

“The most important thing that I was concerned about was that the lads would stick together and we managed that.

“Yes we struggled in the first half with our free taking and when Gooch came on he made a massive difference and kicked some lovely points which made all the difference.

“The last three or four weeks have been difficult and we have had to struggle to win our three matches but this is where we wanted to be, facing an All-Ireland quarter-final at Croke Park where we have played very well in the past.

“People always seem to expect you to win these type of games easily enough but that is not the way it works but I will admit that the football we played out there in the last 15 minutes was as good as we played all year and probably comparable to our period in the second half of the replay against Cork in the Munster final.”

Antrim Manager Liam Bradley took the defeat in a very sporting manner.

“I'm very proud of my players in what they have achieved this summer and to come down here and play so well against a team like Kerry,” he said.

Cooper was faultless in his free taking, kicking the first of his quartet seven minutes into the second half and then slotting over his three others at various stages of the second half before another substitute, Paul O'Connor, converted two others in the late stages when Kerry had a stronghold on the game after Paul Galvin slipped in to drive home his side's second goal.

That second goal came as a total relief to the massive Kerry following among the 8,500 crowd who could only admire the manner in which Antrim players showed no mental problems from their defeat by Tyrone in the Ulster final the previous week.

Antrim repeatedly opened up Kerry with some stylish football from their half-back line of Tony Scullion, Justin Croziere and James Loughrey with Aodhan Gallagher and Niall McKeever giving Kerry problems at midfield while Paddy Cunningham and Tomas McCann took their points well.

They really shocked Kerry after only 19 minutes when Loughrey cut

through from defence before picking up his fellow defender, Scullion, who crashed the ball to the net.

Antrim led at the interval by 1-4 to 1-3 and extended that further with a point from McCann on the resumption.

But then Kerry hit back with four point on the trot with Galvin, Cooper, Walsh and centre-back, Mike McCarthy, most influential but some excellent point scoring from Michael McCann kept Antrim in the hunt during the second half.

Antrim gave Kerry a game of it all the way, right up to the finish, and might well have scored a late goal when Loughrey raced through from 15 yards before he fired a shot on target that Diarmuid Murphy saved only to rebound to Loughrey whose effort was blocked by Mark O Se.

In the last 15 minutes Kerry were firmly in control and looked more like the team that have been in the All-Ireland series every year since 2000 but the pressure still grows on O'Connor to get his team playing in a way that is acceptable to the critical Kerry supporters.

Kerry: D Murphy; T O'Sullivan, K Young, T Griffin; A O'Mahony, M McCarthy, M O Se; D O Se, S Scanlon; P Galvin 1-2, T Kennelly, S O’Sullivan 0-1 f; Darren O' Sullivan, Declan O'Sullivan 0-1, T Walsh 1-2, 0-1 f. Subs: C Cooper 0-4 f for S O'Sullivan. T O Se for O'Mahony. D Walsh for Kennelly. P O'Connor 0-2 f for Darren O'Sullivan. M Quirke for Scanlon.

Antrim: J Finucane; C Brady, A McClean, K O'Boyle; T Scullion 1-0, J Crozier, J Loughrey; N McKeever, A Gallagher; T O'Neill, C Close 0-1, K Niblock; P Cunningham 0-3, 2 f, M McCann 0-4, 3 f, T McCann 0-2. Subs: S Burke for Niblock. C Murray for Close. K Brady for O'Neill.

Referee: J White (Donegal).