All-Ireland SFC Qualifiers, round four/Dublin v Roscommon: A few years ago the Dublin side were in Torremolinos for training. On an evening off a few of the team were sitting chatting and Vinnie Murphy was on a bit of a roll.

Following his disclosure that after a day's work he found nourishment in fresh cod and chips washed down with a diet coke before heading out for refreshment, there was some grumbling from his fellow players. Vinnie assured the company that as the complete athlete he could run on any fuel which was put into him.

Warming to the theme, Vinnie looked around the table and began assessing the players in terms of models of car. Dessie Farrell was a Cadillac - grand in straight lines. Niall O'Donoghue was a Mini Cooper for obvious reasons. And so on. When it came to Ian Robertson, Vinnie paused. Robertson is the classiest and most thoughtful of players, a significant presence in any team he graces. Finally Vinnie pronounced Robertson to be a Lada - always breaking down.

That was quite a while ago and it seems a long time since Westmeath came to Croke Park and beat Dublin only to go home again and decide beating Dublin wasn't the summit they thought it might be.

Much has changed. Football seasons are organic things and the qualifier system means nothing stays still for long. Westmeath are getting ready for an All-Ireland quarter-final. Dublin have been away, touring the highways and byways as they repaired themselves. It seems they have found a viable way of living together for a championship summer. And they have rediscovered Ian Robertson.

There's a change in the Dubs' complexion and outlook too. Somewhere along the line, whether the locus of power has shifted slightly or whether enlightenment has dawned, the Dublin team selections began to change. Still we endure the churlish business of not releasing a team-sheet to media or fans before a game but the line-out which dispatched Longford in Portlaoise a few weeks ago was pretty much what one might have ended up with had the team been chosen by plebiscite in the city.

And if Dublin had been asked to choose a route to recovery they could scarcely have come up with a more gentle, restorative rehabilitation than that offered by London, Leitrim and Longford. By the time they played the second half against Longford they were humming, confidence seeping back into the system, looking happy.

New outlook and new complexion but it's more. Dublin don't quite look like All-Ireland contenders but they look solid enough to remind us Dublin teams should never be far off.

Of all the good news which has come after the deluge of setbacks there is no snippet better than that announcing the return of Robertson and Dessie Farrell to the party. If you were to diagnose Dublin and write them a quick prescription Farrell and Robertson would be the curative of choice.

Dublin have needed wisdom and class. It's no secret that when last season ended in messy calamity many senior players found that they had lost confidence in the management. There was a whiff of gunpowder in the air, as players met and plotted.

The fact nothing happened is a reflection neither on the management nor the disenchanted players. Seasons end, players go back to their clubs, life goes on. Robertson had been allowed drift. Farrell wasn't recalled. The impression when Dublin reconvened this year was that the dressing-room was singularly lacking in strong characters. Players like a quiet life and so do management, but a placid, dead dressing-room benefits neither.

So somewhere along the line this summer somebody took the decision to smash the emergency glass, set the alarm bells ringing and recall Robertson and Farrell. The Dublin players have been handed back some of their old routines, like player meetings, and they have had restored to those meetings players who always have something worthwhile to say. Instantly Dublin looked like a side with leadership and wisdom again.

Of Dessie Farrell enough is known to obviate the need for third-party recommendations and his 30-yard shot (with his newly discovered right foot) against Longford which rattled the woodwork was a timely reminder that players of his class and intelligence enhance any side.

Of Robertson less is known outside the city. Suffice it to say were it not for injury he could have been Moynihan, he could have been McGeeney. Now approaching his late 20s it's not too late for him to be something else, something just as necessary.

Robertson is Dublin's great lost leader, a classic, cerebral player who inspires those around him and makes better players of those he plays with. He is smart and adaptable and the fulcrum of any side he plays on. Back in his minor days his fellow players voted unanimously for him to be team captain. He started the summer at full forward in 1994 and game by game moved back through the lines until he turned up at centre back, a position he looked like holding down in the senior team for many years.

Injury wrecked that notion but as a full forward, a position in which Robertson has been deployed since the late 1990s, the player can operate with less energy and unlimited intelligence.

Off the field he enjoys the sort of success which would have qualified him for the Dublin side of the 1970s. A long-term student, he specialised first in solid-state physics before deciding a few years ago to embark on a career in medicine.

His return to the Dublin colours has been as a full forward, a posting which represents a nice marriage of needs and means. Since Ray Cosgrove became estranged from the player he was in 2002 Dublin have needed a focus to their attacks. Not just that - they have needed a big player and a smart player rolled into one.

Robertson, who has played in every position down the middle for the county side, has perhaps reached an age where full forward is the most viable option. He has experience there and was blossoming into a fine exponent of the number 14's art a few years ago, punctuating the seasons of 1999, 2000 and 2001 with good and vital goals but struggling, as did most full forwards, against Meath's Darren Fay.

Even that period was pocked by absences through injury. His memorable goal and a point against Offaly in 1999 were scored despite having picked up a debilitating knock in training and he was slowly grinding to a halt thereafter. In 2001 by the time Dublin got to play Kerry in the quarter-final replay, Robertson was crocked again.

A few years on, the evidence is he can still function as a full forward, getting by on intelligence and wit and without as much buffeting and exertion as defensive positions require. That's important.

His list of injuries since captaining the Dublin minor side of 1994 would be disastrous were it to befall an entire platoon of combat soldiers. For one man to have spent so much time on operating tables that he qualifies for tenant protection and still have a viable career ahead of him is remarkable.

A quick trawl through the back-page headlines concerning Robertson is a useful exercise in physiology. He has had shin trouble ankle trouble, knee trouble, groin trouble, back trouble, calf trouble. That on top of the quotidian ailments and twangs besetting most top-level athletes.

In addition, for quite some time, the Dublin football scene hummed with rumours of a rift between the current team management and key senior players, Robertson being one. The same rumours suggest he was unhappy in particular with the treatment of his clubmate Davy Byrne.

The Dublin management have always denied there was any distance between themselves and Robertson and the player typically has declined to comment.

Whatever the case, until this summer Robertson hadn't played championship football since the drawn quarter-final with Kerry back in 2001.

After a chat with Tommy Lyons at Christmas the offer came for the county board to pay for the treatment for the calf trouble hobbling Robertsonat the time. Bridges were mended. Dublin have benefited.

Robertson brings a degree of substance to any style whether it be style of football or style of management.

In the last round against Longford a lot of the Dublin forward play just revolved around him and he appeared as composed as the conductor of an orchestra, bringing in players here and there and scoring a goal himself.

Whoever had the idea to bring Robertson and Farrell back into the Dublin fold a couple of months ago has made a large contribution to the season.

Dublin didn't just benefit from the return of two fine footballers but the dressing-room had some leadership restored to it. Tom Carr once said of Robertson that if he had five Ian Robertsons he'd have no problem playing them down the centre for Dublin.

Robertson's misfortune with injury has been such over the past few years that it would have taken five Ian Robertsons to hold down a single place. Tomorrow Carr comes up against the player who, fit and healthy, might have changed his own history as a manager. That subplot alone should be worth the admission.