Performance of the day: Keith Duggan talks to comeback king DJ Carey and hears his team-mates pay tribute to the legend in their midst "
Another September for Kilkenny's godsend and perhaps the most precious of all. On a day when Brian Cody, the gentle and iron-minded Bainisteoir of the black and amber mingled past and present with beautiful cohesion, one man hovered above the changing of the guard. DJ. He is still the Kilkenny story.
It is after five o'clock and the watery autumn sun has dropped behind the great stadium and DJ Carey is on the edge of the field. He is standing on the red carpet underneath the Hogan, a procession of Kilkenny supporters gazing down at him as he speaks. They are calling his name. He is smiling and waving. He is being DJ. To think he could have been among them in the stands. To think he was just a watcher earlier this summer.
"It is frightening," he admits.
"I was up here watching the Leinster final and I had an edge in me but I just felt disappointed, that the year was gone. I was very passionate, nearly playing the game in the stands, and it was hard. Whatever control you have on the field, you have none when you are sitting in the stands.
"I am just glad now I didn't have to be a spectator today and, hopefully, won't have to be for another few years."
One goal, three points from play and three frees was his contribution yesterday. His scores were the bookends of Kilkenny's magnificent tally of 2-20. In ignorant times, we questioned if DJ could get it done on royal afternoons like this. Oh, we have all had our answer.
"DJ," whispered John Power later on, "set this All-Ireland in motion."
The sharp breeze had just begun to carry the keening notes of Amhrán na bhFiann across the north of the city when DJ reminded us of his repertoire. A goal from the blue, a rapier thrust at the dropping white comet and then the black fist raised in triumph. Sweet and sharp and inimitable.
"I saw Henry winning the ball and go on a run. He was going to my corner so I ran to the far side, just to give him room. I just thought maybe that the Clare men were catching him so I said, 'I'll take a chance. If he mis-hits it, there is no one behind me, if he strikes it clean, it's a point'. And he either passed or didn't connect 100 per cent and I just stuck the hurl up and flicked it on. It was just one of those things."
One of a thousand over the years. Such was the supremacy of this latest Kilkenny triumph that DJ might well be eclipsed for the official man of the match by some of his younger team-mates. But in the dressing-room, they see him as the alchemist, their great touchstone.
"Coming off the field there I could hear everyone chantin' his name," said Martin Comerford, the team's lanky young joker and battling full forward.
"It would raise the hair on the back of your head. Sure to think that last year I was up in the stands shoutin' his name meself."
They will remember this as DJ's comeback. Two games.
"Sure one of the lads was saying he has to be the most improved hurler in Kilkenny this year. He gets better with each game," says Henry Shefflin with a burst of laughter.
"Sure what odds if he only played two. I saw a sign out there walking round in the parade, 'DJ for Pope'. Well, we reckon he might go for Taoiseach first. We'll see.
"But it was great to have him back. When we heard he might be coming, there was a great buzz in training. Because he is a legend to us, and he always will be. Like, that goal today. That is DJ in a nutshell."
Then there were the distant frees, imperious scoops that carried on a bullet's trajectory through the swirling breeze.
And also, The Moment. Midway through the second half, DJ spun onto a low ball and the Clare defence converged on him. The ball spun towards the Hogan sideline and DJ hared after it. Thundering after him was the soul during the unforgettable Clare fires, Ollie Baker. Ollie wanted to win this passage of play so badly his features could be read from the sky-most tiers of the Hogan. DJ ghosted this way and that. Ollie stayed close. DJ feinted, and feinted again. Ollie stayed brave as ever. DJ jinked again and Ollie stretched but he is only human and his body tumbled to the soil.
As Ollie hit the grass, DJ paused, perfectly still amidst the sound and the fury. Then he struck another fine point but it was the preceding second, the pause, that people will always remember. You felt that the mystery of the 2002 All-Ireland lived and died in that instant.
"You know, the biggest thrill of all my career was to play with DJ there," murmurs John Power later, nursing the joy of another All-Ireland along with the wake of his own great hurling life.
"People kinda doubted him a year or two ago, so it was powerful to see him out there putting in a performance like that. He was better than ever. We will never see the like of him again for composure and eye and his respect for the other players. The way he'd give a call to the player in trouble.
"He is a great individual and it's only a small bit of his own he takes from it. He hands out to everyone else what he has."
And it is true. DJ Carey seems to have a spirit that belongs to a more noble age. Openness shines from him. That and Andy Comerford's perfect epitaph for this team, humble. DJ has humility.
"We are just fortunate," says Power, savouring the sight of his team-mate in a winning dressing-room for the last time, "that he lives in Kilkenny and plays the game here. And it's great that when I am 80 and he is 70, or whatever, to be able to appreciate that and be able to say that I hurled with such a man."
Power is smiling but solemn too. He is not alone. It will be the clear, shining recall of many a dotage.
