The city game is edging towards greatness and the Dublin football team is claiming the teenage decade of this young century. On a slate-grey day in the capital, the Dubs kept their feet and their heads as the rain fell heavily over Croke Park to prise the Sam Maguire from Kerry.
The dream final, maybe, but no classic as the wet season had the last laugh here. The famous field became a skating rink, the football as obedient as a mischievous pup. The 128th All-Ireland final finished 0-12 to 0-9, with Kerry, the arch survivors, seeking to pilfer a goal in the 74th minute gloom. Dublin held strong.
“If you had told me this morning that Dublin would only score 12 points I’d have bitten your hand off,” admitted Éamonn Fitzmaurice as Kerry came to terms with a winter without their most famous resident.
Grim as the defeat is for Kerry, the acceptance of their third consecutive summer defeat to the Blues since 2011 is almost as dismaying. What was once a nostalgic rivalry has been turned on its head.
Kerry hung in here through tenacity and smartness – the virtues of Fitzmaurice’s reign – but couldn’t repel the attacking verve of Jim Gavin’s team. The blue fans were left on tenterhooks as shots drifted wide and Brian Fenton’s fine goal shot thumped off the post at the Hill end.
But history and decades rhymed in the 67th minute when Alan Brogan carried a ball towards the Hill. The moment contained reflections of his father, Bernard, bolting towards the same goal in September 1977. Options presented all around him, including the brother Bernard. Alan backed himself and floated the biggest score of the day. That settled nerves in the stadium, in the city pubs and in the suburbs. Now, the current generation stand with the revered 1970s Dublin team in having won three All-Irelands in a decade.
"They are different eras," said Jim Gavin gently.
“Certainly, they have achieved a lot and even speaking to them there, they will enjoy this moment. But nothing will ever match Kevin Heffernan’s team and what he did for Dublin GAA. His spark and genius: we just stand on his shoulders, really. Dublin football wouldn’t be what it is but for those Seventies teams who really brought the city alive again to Gaelic football. I don’t think you can ever compare with those giants of the game.”
Still, the crowd danced to Thin Lizzy at the whistle and Gavin’s team fairly electrified the Dublin skyline on Sunday night: three All-Irelands in five years and the promise of more to come. The Kingdom war room will burn candles this winter.
