So far, the current All-Ireland football championship has been notable for the abrupt exit of box office names rather than for any shimmering football. There have, of course, been isolated moments of awesome craft and chief among those was Martin Flanagan's dazzling goal against Laois on the June Bank Holiday Monday.

His 55th-minute dash and resultant shot propelled Westmeath past their neighbours for the first time in 30 years and ended a turbulent few months for the team. It was an audacious, spirited move, one which he will be asked to reflect on for many years.

"I remember it fairly clearly all right. Martin Murtagh passed me the ball from in on the right wing and whoever it was came to tackle me I managed to get past. There was 20 or 30 yards ahead of me then at which to run at and I just took off. Another defender came in and I sidestepped him and I think it was then that I thought about the goal.

"I saw another lad coming across me and thankfully I just managed to get the shot in before he got there. It was a great feeling, particularly given the timing of the goal."

The moment marked a clean break for Westmeath from the protracted fallout from the O'Byrne Cup debacle. On February 6th, on a slightly surreal day in Mullingar with 11,000 people thronging the town for what has traditionally been the sleepy black and white matinee of football competitions, Westmeath's plans went up in smoke when they lost to Longford.

"It was an atrocious day to begin with, the place was so wet the game probably shouldn't have been played. I broke my arm after two minutes and things got worse for us from there in," says Flanagan.

Westmeath lost amid a welter of controversy surrounding their team manager Brendan Lowry. "It was an upsetting time for the panel," Flanagan says. "Like, for the weeks after that, we didn't even know if we were going to have a manager. Shortly after that game, we lost narrowly to Offaly in the league and that sort of set a trend for the rest of the campaign. So our confidence took a bit of a buffeting."

As a result, the Westmeath supporters, given to greater expectations after the recent years of underage success, were understandably tentative about the side's chances going into the game against Laois. History pointed to another early exit.

"After the league, we really did manage to get back on the rails in terms of our confidence and belief. It's hard to put a finger on exactly what enabled us to do that. Perhaps it was because we had a full squad together for the first time in an age, after injuries and suspensions."

Flanagan himself was back kicking ball in late April, having spent most of the previous few months in the swimming pool.

"I was eager to return a lot sooner but just wasn't allowed, to be honest. I'm glad, looking back, because when I did return I didn't feel the need to hold back, my arm felt as strong as it had ever been."

Although he was aware that Westmeath fans had ventured to Tullamore for the Laois game with considerable trepidation, Flanagan had a gut feeling about the day.

"For me, it simply came down to the fact that we had a pretty good squad of players. Okay, we hadn't beaten them (Laois) in all that time but I felt we should have beaten them two years ago and even though they beat us well last year, I thought we had the potential to match them. And this time things didn't go well for them.

"We really could have been 10 points up at half-time and they went an awful long period without a score. You can't really do that and expect to win."

While Flanagan was busy contributing to the summer's highlight reel, the country at large was still ingesting Meath's defeat the previous day. That loss seemed to get the blood up all around the country. "It certainly gave us a boost going out to play on the Monday," says the Westmeath man.

Westmeath met Dublin in a challenge game in Swords recently which the city team won by 10 points. Dessie Dolan and Flanagan were both absent, and the result has not set alarm bells ringing.

"As far as I know we played fairly well, despite the result. To be honest, I have seen very little of them, except for the highlights of their win over Wexford. But they are a strong side and we know that we'll have to be on our game."

When last the two teams met in the summer, in 1996, Dublin were defending their All-Ireland title and they brushed Westmeath aside on a scoreline of 1-18 to 0-11. The lopsided nature of the scoreboard suggested that both teams knew the natural order of things. But if there was a sense of inevitability over meetings between the two in the past, that has evaporated in the past few years.

"We respect Dublin but, I mean, going to Croke Park holds no fears for us. It is the place every footballer wants to play in. If we could get beyond Dublin, well, anything could happen. Winning the game would be great in itself. It is not beyond us."