DUBLIN HAVE TURNED THE TABLES ON KERRY
VINNIE MURPHY knows a thing or two about the Dublin-Kerry rivalry.
One of the most famous stories revolves around the road trip to Thurles in 2001 for a unique All-Ireland quarterfinal. Sharing a room with teammate Wayne McCarthy, Murphy, a keen Star Trek fan, stepped out of the shower to be told that actor Colm Meaney was passing by outside the team hotel, The Horse and Jockey.
So he decided to honour the moment by rushing over to the window and recreating that jawdropping scene in Monty Python’s Life of Brian when the mistakenly anointed one reveals himself — quite literally — to the masses.
Except, Murphy insists, he didn’t drop his towel as he roared down ‘Beam me up, Scotty’. In a wonderfully colourful life and times interview with the Irish
Daily Star last year, he attempted to set the record straight.
No matter, his appearance in the Dublin colours for that Kerry game added another layer to his cult hero status. Sprung from the bench with his team eight down with 12 minutes to go, Murphy entered the field in full bumpercar mode, bouncing off various Kerry shoulders to lift the crowd before plundering a goal, and causing enough general chaos that Dublin struck for a second and would have won the game only for Maurice Fitzgerald’s iconic equaliser from a sideline ball.
By then, he was savouring his second coming, recalled to the squad by Tommy Carr after spending over three years exiled in, of all places, Kerry. Lured down by Páidí Ó Sé as a coaching officer for Kerins O’Rahillys, Murphy only missed one game in all that time.
He earned the mantle of top scorer in Kerry in the county league. Chairman Pat Healy paid him the richest of tributes on his departure back to Dublin in 2000: ‘He was one of the best kickers of a ball you could see. We are the top club in the county in the county league for two years in a row and we were also in the club final and he was very much part of it all.
‘He was the greatest thing to hit Strand Road and the guys that were cribbing about him originally are sorry to see him go now.’ So yes, he knows a thing or two about the Dublin-Kerry rivalry. One wonders what they made on Strand Road of his sentiments following Kerry’s latest mauling by the old enemy at Croke Park on Sunday — 12 points the largest of the eight defeats in 11 meetings suffered by Éamonn Fitzmaurice at the hands of Jim Gavin’s Dublin. ‘As a Dub to be living at a time when a Dublin team like this is playing is surreal... Kerry up to today really felt that they are as good... afraid not .... wow and wow. by the end of this run, Dublin may lead the roll of honour.’ Now that’s a statement. Could they do the unthinkable and pass Kerry out on the All-Ireland senior football honours list? At the moment, the gap is 10 — Kerry (37), Dublin (27). Galway’s nine titles leaves them third in the roll of honour. The tilt in the balance of power this decade is enough to make Kerry heads spin. For the guts of 100 years now, Kerry’s dominance has been one of the game’s eternal truths. Dublin’s strike rate in terms of All-Irelands is actually buoyed by a cascade of titles during the association’s formative years, before truly organised intercounty competition as we know it.
The first six titles were grouped together in the 1890s; the next five at the turn of the century. By 1908, Dublin topped the roll of honour on 11. That was a time when official records show counties still being represented by clubs.
Consider then that, up until the breakthrough success of 2011 and Stephen Cluxton’s winning free, Dublin only won another 11 in the next 102 years, from 1908 to 2010. That’s a strike rate of just over one a decade.
Kerry’s first title didn’t come until 1903. Significantly, it was immediately followed up by a second. The chase was on. From a point where Kerry swept to five titles in the 1930s, they have remained the pre-eminent force in the game: the benchmark. And 1940 was significant for being the first time Kerry equalled Dublin in the roll of honour, matching their 14 titles.
The following year was a landmark for Kerry, stealing ahead for the first time, albeit only for a season. From a point where Kerry won again in 1946, they have left Dublin in their slipstream in terms of the numbers game.
Except, five All-Irelands for Dublin in the last seven seasons is beginning to bring even the roll of honour into the conversation. Complete a four-in-a-row this September and it will be the first time any county has annexed six titles in a single decade since Dublin achieved the historic feat in the 1890s.
There is a sense of the game coming full circle.
In that same interview last year, Murphy told of once again being invited down to Kerry by Páidí Ó Sé. Recently retired and managing his own club Trinity Gaels, this time the offer was for the club to play in Páidí’s tournament.
A hammering by An Ghaeltacht was a good enough excuse to hit the tiles with Darragh Ó Sé and other esteemed Kerry company.
In search of a taxi after the nightclub, Murphy was recognised by some locals who broke out into a chant more favoured by Hill 16: ‘Vinnie’s gonna get you! Vinnie’s gonna get you!’
The worry for Kerry is that the phrase is being reworked with the roll of honour and Dublin in mind.