SEÁN DUNNE, the proprietor of the D4 hotel group, is standing outside the main entrance of the building formerly known as Jury’s – Kerry’s HQ. He is flanked by a few well-oiled Kerry men and the gardaí. Sam Maguire was about to be bussed out to Our Lady’s Children’s hospital in Crumlin.

It is 11am. The morning after the night before. The Gooch and captain Darran O’Sullivan are laughing as they stroll through the lobby. Ger O’Keeffe, Jack O’Connor’s chief lieutenant for two tenures now, stalls to chat about events.

Then the man himself appears and guides the media into a boardroom to rummage through any matters left untouched.

A pint of iced water in close proximity, O’Connor requests a brief inquisition, but soon settles into a decent chat.

The future of the squad is dealt with, but really nothing will truly be revealed until January. O’Connor looks to the longevity of Kilkenny’s success, a humble gesture it must be said, when asked about the future potential for his current group.

“The secret is what Cody does in Kilkenny – he keeps re-jigging the team. There must have been four or five changes from the All-Ireland last year. That’s the third of a team. And that’s about all you could so without totally dismantling the team. I remember in 2004, we did something similar.”

And he names the changes, asking us for to assist. Tommy Griffin at full back. Mike Mac. The unique personality and energy of Paul Galvin back in harness. Tadhg Kennelly. Darran O’Sullivan reaching full maturity.

Michael McCarthy was the rock, he feels, that helped move them from qualifier team to All-Ireland contenders. Think the opening minute against Dublin and that piercing run.

“Mike Mac did that for us this year. He gave us fierce impetus there in the middle.”

The story of meeting Kennelly last November is re-told, as is the pursuing of McCarthy.

This job required several helpers and some gentle “cajoling”.

Ger O’Keeffe tells us they even had an emissary approach Mrs McCarthy (“. . .you have to keep the girls happy as well.”).

“I hopped it off him at the start of the year,” says Jack. “He said he’d think about it, but he didn’t really have the appetite for it. Then, after the Cork game in Páirc Uí Chaoimh, I had another go at him.

“He agreed to meet me and I knew . . . I rang one of the selectors and I said ‘I think I have Mike Mac’ even before he met me. The fact that he agreed to meet me, Mike Mac isn’t the sort of a fella who’d meet you to shoot the breeze. He said he’d have a go at it and the man never looked back since.

“Even though we were pretty down after Cork, I thought that was big. We knew in our heart and soul in the management that we’d have to do a bit of rebuilding in that team. You get feelings about it. Even the penalty we conceded that day. It was an oul’ ball kicked in by John Miskella – a nothing ball. A couple of backs half went for it and half looked at each other.

“We felt then that we needed a presence in the full-back line, a big, strong fella. And Tommy Griffin fitted the bill.”

Then there was the South Kerry insider knowledge that Declan O’Sullivan could catch fire at full forward. Bring a new dimension to the attack in Kieran Donaghy’s enforced absence.

In 2004 Cork beat them in Munster, prompting Donaghy’s move inside. Suddenly, Jack O’Connor’s Kerry changed the way teams played football. The twin towers saw this tactic evolve.

Then Tyrone found a way to neuter it. O’Connor saw O’Sullivan as the ideal man to shift the patterns once more by dropping off the last attackers – some soccer parlance is even borrowed.

“What we managed to do this year was vary our game-plan. We were gone a bit predictable. Teams were finding it too easy to defend against our tactics. Declan O’Sullivan gave us a completely new dimension at full forward. Most people in Kerry will tell you Declan can’t play in full forward, but I know he can because I spent years kicking the ball into him.

“He played full forward with the school. We put it up to him as a new challenge for him and developed his game and I thought he was sensational. He gave an awful lot of bother in the first half, coming into the “pocket” there – like in soccer, a player dropping off the main striker. We had Gooch buzzing around the place and we had Tommy inside as an aerial threat. You’ve got to keep the opposition guessing.”

Aidan O’Mahony’s steep fall from grace is broached. Once a rock in the half-back line, this season he became a bit-part player.

“He’s been through a lot, mentally and physically over the last few years. I just think psychologically it took a toll on him. You had the drug thing and you had a few other things and I just think it took a toll on him. But he’s still a relatively young man and I think there’s mileage in him if he wants it enough.”

“He agreed to meet me and I knew.

I rang one of the selectors and I said ‘I think I have Mike Mac’ even before he met me. The fact that he agreed to meet me, Mike Mac isn’t the sort of a

fella who’d meet you to shoot

the breeze