He's been at this lark for half a century. Yesterday, after his debut with his newest charges, Laois, Mick O'Dwyer spoke to Keith Duggan
The photographers waited in front of the tunnel for Mick O'Dwyer, and so naturally he slipped through one of the side exits and was on the field in Laois before anyone really noticed. He was never one for ceremony.
Not many hundreds showed up at O'Moore Park to witness Micko's first day in charge of Laois. When the announcement was made late last year, many thought it a puzzling combination: one of the GAA's talismanic figures and a county famous for producing child stars. It was right for Laois, though.
When the senior team played here in the championship on a balmy Saturday last July, something snapped. Meath baited and toyed and finally destroyed the illusion that Laois was a sleeping giant waiting on all its celebrated minor prodigies to click. Confidence evaporated, and it will take all of O'Dwyer's much-loved enthusiasm, his simple conviction and the weight of his achievements to restore it.
Already, though, his arrival has brought about the un-retirement of Hughie Emerson and the return of Colm Parkinson, a talent so rarely seen that many started to believe he was an urban myth. Along with the adored Brian McDonald and the languid Ian Fitzgerald, these players make, on paper, as devastating a forward unit as a county could wish for. On paper.
Frostbite cares little for reputation and Micko lasted all of 100 seconds seated on the wooden bench he shared with the selectors as the Laois era began. This year marks his 50th year involved with intercounty football, a phenomenal feat in its own right.
But longevity and survival have been the real touchstones of the O'Dwyer story over the last two decades. Most of the players he shared a dressing-room here cannot remember his Kerry days, when he was the king with laughing eyes of a team that was untouchable. His 12 years with Kildare were often as frustrating and full of disappointment as his reign with Kerry was majestic.
But through his perseverance and gradual ascent with the Lilywhites to the 1998 All-Ireland football final, his football life entered a new and distinct phase. Kildare's fall in last year's championship, when they capitulated tiredly to a Kerry team playing irresistible football, was considered by everyone as a fitting way for O'Dywer to bow out. A final handshake with Páidí Ó Sé, his captain, his favourite pupil - the passing of the torch and all of that.
But O'Dwyer thought differently. And so, at 66, the most decorated manager in the game begins life as manager of Laois.
"Just the 50th year," he chuckles after watching his latest team go down 0-10 to 0-13 to neighbours Longford in the O'Byrne Cup. "And it's going on and going on all the time. Well, I'm still getting great enjoyment out of it, and as long as I enjoy it I'll keep with it. Simple as that.
"There was good football in that today, you know. We came back well in the second half but we seemed to die at the finish. I suppose we missed an easy free. But overall it was okay, an educational game more than anything."
It was one of those days when you could hear the individual observations from the stands, and for the first 20 minutes they were none to flattering.
"Get up, ya f**king eejit." "Ah Jaysus no, no, noooooo." "Let it on, let it on to f**k."
O'Dywer just watched and was silent over the first half hour, when he had much to be silent about. Longford, big and lively, cantered into a 0-5 to 0-1 lead, banging away merrily in the freezing air. Padraig Shanley epitomised all that was best about the visitors, strong and direct and skilful. His four scores from play softened the killing chill for a small time.
Laois were static, keeping in touch through three frees from Damien Delaney. Big Hughie, a one-man talent show for Laois in the late 1990s, seemed a little shell-shocked to be back on the field for the first half hour. But it was terrifically cold and he was at the heart of the home team's most promising move when he forced a great save off Gavin Tonra.
For 10 minutes in the second half, they looked beautiful, all flow and business. And then they went cold again.
"Ah, it's early in the year," smiled O'Dwyer. "A learning process, because I hadn't seen that Laois team play at all apart from training, so it was useful today. I had the same start with Kildare, you know, if you think back, so I would only hope that it would work along the same lines here as it did there. But we have a lot of work to do. 'Twould be unfair to take too much from today."
And he is right. 'Twould be unfair to take anything from these frigid January days. Except, of course, that legends do not settle for Sundays by the fire.
LAOIS: F Byron; JP Kehoe, K Fitzpatick, T McDonald (0-1); D Conroy, D Rooney, M Lalor; P Clancy, N Garvan; B McDonald, I Fitzgerald (0-3, 2 frees), G Kavanagh (0-1); D Delaney (0-4, frees), H Emerson, C Parkinson (0-1). Substitutes: J Higgins for M Lalor (39 mins), S Kelly for H Emerson (53 mins), M Lalor for G Kavanagh (53 mins).
LONGFORD: G Tonra; D Brady, C Conefrey, D Ledwith; M Mulleady, E Ledwith, A O'Connor; L Keenan, J O'Callaghan (0-1); M Lennon (0-1), P Barden (0-2), P Ross; T Smullen (0-1), P Shanley (0-4), P Davis (0-4, 2 frees). Substitutes: R Clyne for T Smullen (52 mins), D Smyth for J O'Callaghan (68 mins).
Referee: F Barrett (Kildare)
