The Dublin dressing-room emptied quickly. By the time Sean Boylan came in to speak softly about hard things, most of the team had vanished. There was no cheering mob outside to detain them, just wives and girlfriends and the consolation of widespread anonymity.

So ended the decade for the Dubs. Four Leinster titles, one All-Ireland win and two losing appearances in the All-Ireland final. Precisely the same as what the 1980s threw up. Expectations are higher, but, apart from the splurge of the Seventies, that appears to be about the level of achievement which Dublin have settled on. One All-Ireland in the Sixties. Ditto in the Fifties.

Yesterday Meath, who have parlayed seven provincial titles into three All-Ireland wins since 1980, won at a canter. Their urgency and hunger seemed greater. Tom Carr, the Dublin manager, could see the drift of the argument but refuted its premise.

"I would like to think that our hunger was as great as theirs. We were very hungry and committed, we put a huge amount of effort into the last year and into building up a side, and I suppose we were exposed to some degree today. That's the way it is."

The battle against the expectations of the city is a constant one. Hill 16 bulged again yesterday. On a sunny day people were prepared to believe.

"We never contended that we were there, that we had built up a team and were ready to mount a serious challenge for an All-Ireland. But we were happy with the amount of work we had done in the year. We were happy with the progress we had made."

Jim Gavin, the Dublin forward and joint scorer when that title came without bragging rights, was despondent about the level of performance.

"I suppose we were attacking for the first 10 minutes of the second half, but it was guys getting to the 21-yard line and taking the wrong options and spilling the ball."

The irony was that it was a day which tradition would say was tailor made for the Dubs. Big crowd. Sun drenched. Meath.

"Funny. We were waiting for a sunny day. I was delighted when I saw the weather forecast. Dublin teams by nature normally play well on big days when the sun is shining, but today, well I suppose it's down to the 15 guys on the field. It's their fault, nobody else. We weren't finding Ian Robertson with good ball."

He prepares to move on, sums up the emptiness of losing to Meath in high summer.

"It's a dent to morale. Life is fragile and football is fragile. We haven't been in a Leinster final in three years, and there's no guarantee of us getting back into one this year or next year."

He is about the last of them to leave. As a bunch they will probably never be constituted in precisely the same way again.