"We're coming, we're here and watch out. Sean Crowe is the next TD for Dublin South West." The youthful Mr Mark Daly had just been elected as a Sinn Fein councillor for Tallaght Central on the sixth count, bringing to two the number of Sinn Fein councillors among the first-elected.
He was referring to his colleague, Mr Sean Crowe, who had been elected on the first count in Tallaght South along with Fianna Fail's Mr John Hannon. The only other councillor elected on the first count was Mr Charlie O'Connor, also of Fianna Fail, in Tallaght Central. Mr Daly was hoarse from cheering but he managed to tell supporters that this was their victory, not that of their new councillors, as he stood arm-in-arm with Mr Crowe and Northern Ireland Assembly Member, Mr Martin McGuinness, outside the Basketball Arena in Tallaght. Sinn Fein's putative Minister in the Northern Ireland Assembly, Mr McGuinness told the jubilant supporters that they had got a tremendous result all over the State.
"There will be more Sinn Fein TDs elected next time," he said. "You could have a situation where Sinn Fein is in government in the North and Sinn Fein in government in the South. The logic is that the division of the country will have to end."
The neat suits worn by the candidates did not yet look like everyday wear, and the bottles pressed into their hands contained Spanish sparkling wine rather than champagne, but the aura of success among the large crowd of enthusiastic supporters, many of them young, was palpable.
Inside the Basketball Arena, Labour TD Pat Rabbitte, whose first preference vote was little more than half that of Mr Sean Crowe, was worried. "I checked my computer yesterday and I had 679 files in the greater Killinarden area" he told The Irish Times. "I got 50 votes out of it. It's a bit disturbing. It's inviting people like us and Fianna Fail to stay out of these areas and that would be calamitous.
"But what worries me more is the turnout - 32 per cent in South County Dublin and lower in Tallaght. It's profoundly disturbing".
Nonetheless, he succeeded in being elected on the ninth count.