Dublin v Kerry: The myth and the magic

HOSE of a cynical disposition are inclined to look askance at the notion that the Dublin v Kerry All-Ireland Final represents something unique in the history of Gaelic football. The word ‘traditional’ is much used in that context.
Well, as I have said before, I only hope that there is not a traditional outcome. The facts of the matter are that Dublin and Kerry have met in eight All-Ireland finals: Kerry have won six; Dublin have won two. The record from semi-finals is similarly imbalanced.
As rivalries go, it is on about the same level as the rivalry between polar bears and just about any other creature unfortunate enough to wander into their company of an afternoon under the aurora borealis.
And yet there is something unique about it. A lot of that has to do with the fact that they have met in finals at defining points in the history of the sport — 1923 and 1924, just after the Civil War; 1955; and, of course, in the mid-1970s, when Kerry and Dublin was like Ali versus Frazier. To those of us of a certain vintage, looking back it seems as though nothing else mattered sometimes.

The myth was born in 1923. Dublin were going for three in a row and the match itself was delayed due to the fall-out from the Civil War in which players from both counties were involved.
Kerry had refused to play in 1923 in protest at the delay in releasing IRA prisoners and so the final was held in 1924.
The big Dublin club at the time was O’Toole’s, which had as members former Dublin Brigade Volunteers who had been close to Collins and who not only took the Treaty side but some of whom were officers in the Free State Army. The fact that a number of them were active in Kerry, where the Civil War was particularly vicious, added an extra edge to the dispute over the final.
Not all Dublin players were Free Staters. Joe Stynes was an anti-Treaty IRA Volunteer and a former member of O’Toole’s. Such was the animosity generated that he left and joined another club, McCracken’s, which was based in Ballsbridge. Stynes was arrested during the Civil War but O’Toole’s, as county champions, selected Stynes to play for Dublin. Stynes later emigrated to the United States where he became a prominent supporter of Noraid. One of his grand-nephews, Brian, won an All-Ireland with Dublin in 1995. Another, Jim, became one of the stars of Aussie Rules when he emigrated to that country.
Kerry GAA was not universally supportive of the republican side. Two of their iconic players were Con Brosnan and John Joe Sheehy. Brosnan had been in the Free State Army; Sheehy was one of the leading republicans in the county. Like Dublin, to have the two of them on the same team represented a significant step in if not healing old wounds at least cauterising them.

o the final was a big event for all sorts of reasons. ‘The Kerryman’ newspaper looked forward to it with keen anticipation, charitably declaring Dublin were “no fools”. The match was seen as a clash between Kerry’s “high-fielding and punting combination” against the Dubs’ “short, low combination”. It deemed the final to be ‘The Great Who Shall’. Bizzarely, the two teams played a challenge match in Tralee before the final. Dublin won that fairly comfortably. It sounds rough, though. According to ‘The Kerryman’:  “A Dublin man was knocked out . . . but soon resumed amid applause.”
There was even hype in 1924, and 29 trains were put on to bring supporters to Croke Park, but this was before the ‘night train’ from Kerry made famous by Sigerson Clifford, and chaps in Ardfert could rise at a civilised hour in time for the 7:25 train that journeyed on through Tralee and Killarney.
A poem published by ‘The Kerryman’ on the eve of the final struck a poignant note:

Let not politics divide you,
When the foe line up beside you,
Bury deep that piercing hatchet,
That has rent our land in twain.

A then record crowd turned up for the final, estimated by some to have been 60,000. Hill 16 was described by ‘The Freeman’s Journal’ as a “huge living pyramid”. Food for thought for those who seem to believe that the Hill was spawned by imitation of the Kop or the Stretford End.
The newspaper report added that “ - the enormous multitude was strongly divided into partisans of Kerry and Dublin and did nothing to conceal their partisanship ...such a concourse of red enthusiasts as has seldom, if ever, been surpassed in Irish football history.”
Just for the record, the Boys in Blue won but PJ of ‘The Kerryman’ was not convinced and hinted that the Dubs had been dirty. He claimed that Dublin had evinced the “most kindly feelings” for the Kerry lads. “They got so fond of them . . . that it was nothing unusual to see a Dublin player clasping a Kerryman round the neck, playfully pucking him in the back, catching him by the hand or jersey in order that the man for Kerry would not hurt the ball.”
Kerry, in contrast, had played “clean football.”
Was it PJ Spillane, one wonders?
And so the myth lives on. It is no exaggeration to say that if Croke Park held 200,000, Kerry and Dublin would fill it. No conceivable combination of any teams in any sport has the same mystic appeal.
If you are lucky enough to be there, you will not have to be convinced. There is no sound to equal the primeval roar that will greet the two teams when they hit the pitch.
Let’s just hope, that that is the only tradition observed. Pride and a lot lot more is at stake.