‘STAR’ WAS NOT BORN, HE WAS CRAFTED OUT OF PURE DESIRE

HE WALKED into our lives straight out of a comic strip. The first time I ever set eyes on Kieran Donaghy was in a county league match with Austin Stacks in 2004 and I paid no heed. The second time I saw him was one year later when he was stepping out of this banged up blue Opel Astra outside Fitzgerald Stadium as he joined us for Kerry training.

There was something almost comical at seeing this tower of human flesh and bone being poured out of what he made look like a dinky car.

It might as well have been Mr Bean’s Mini, because I remember thinking he could do with a canopener to rip off the roof, rather than have to squeeze his giant frame through that door.

His retirement this week was no shock and while it might not have been the send-off he would have liked – there was no fifth All-Ireland medal to sugar his exit – I bet you that, in time, Kerry’s youngsters like Gavin White, Micheal Burns, Sean O’Shea and David Clifford will take much from sharing a dressing room with a very special player.

When the news broke, I instinctively hit the phone to tweet that he was the best teammate I’d ever had. It was remarkable how that seemed to be almost a recurring theme from so many of his other former teammates. Hell, we can’t all be wrong. Why was that? There is no singular reason.

He is an absolute one-off, just this huge, honest, warm personality that radiated fun which drew you to him. He was a rogue, a prankster, a slagger but he could take it every bit as much as he could dish it out.

We spent our time playing the kind of practical jokes on each other that have me almost blushing now as I write them, because they were so juvenile in nature.

One summer, long after he had ditched the Astra for a machine easier on the eye and his head space, I put fish guts into a plastic bag, squeezed it up into a crevice under the passenger seat. That was one hot smelly week. I would wait for his arrival in the dressing room where I had a receptive audience: ‘Star, I don’t want to be getting too personal but you could nearly do with the shower before training.’

He was going off the head and when he discovered the source of the scent, I spent the rest of that year hiding my car keys.

Another time, when he was starting out, we stayed in the five-star Hayfield Manor in Cork City, and Donaghy checked out with the bag bursting with robes and slippers — reckoned the best value to be had in Christmas shopping was in June.

But being fun is only one element of a good teammate, and he had several.

In my final year in 2016, after being torched by Bernard Brogan in the League final, I knew it was up in terms of getting game-time and he did, too. He rang me one evening, insisted I hopped in the car with him to travel to training, and I remember him imploring me to keep going, to give myself every chance, to squeeze everything I could out of those last few months.

If that spiel came from anyone else, it would have been in one ear and out the other. It was Kieran’s attitude which defined him.

There was a reason I paid no heed that first time I clamped eyes on him, because I only saw a big lanky lad and not a Kerry footballer.

He made himself the player he was. It was no quick leap either and I know in that in the winter of 2005 Jack O Connor went to him and had a serious heart-to-heart with him, laid it on the line and told him that there was a pot there, and he could sit or…

And you could see him making strides after that.

There were evenings inside in training where he would start getting the better of Darragh, prompting big brother to dig into his book of dark secrets to turn the tide of time.

Star learned from that, too, but what we really did not know then was just how quick that football brain of his whirred.

I was one of the first to find out. Prior to that quarter-final against Longford in 2006, Jack moved Donaghy in on me at full-forward and, not only could I not contest the primary ball, but the second option of challenging him on the ground was gone because he had it away in an instant.

It was a revelation that would deliver us an All-Ireland.

But, even when the sweeper system diluted his impact, he remained relevant because of how hard he worked on his skills.

He was a far better player than he was ever given credit for. Check out that equalising point in 2011 final and you will find that was not sourced in hit and hope, but in hours and hours of practice.

He made himself into the player he was. This Star was not born; he was manufactured out of pure desire.

That attitude never left him; he was dropped for the 2013 Munster final, was a bit player for most of the 2014 Championship before he went and won it for us and then was dropped when he was captain in 2015 final.

Never once did he let his personal disappointment sour our dressing room.

So when a guy like that tells you to keep going hard, you tend to go even harder.

The other thing that made him so engaging was his football smarts. Donaghy loves sport.

He is the kind of golfer that could leave you without a pot to sit on if you play him for cash and he is one of the best basketball players in this country, while he also loves soccer and American football.

He is consumed by ball and he is always thinking about it in fine detail.

Kieran was always respectful when he made suggestions in training, and he would always come up with something a little different.

I remember him saying to Jack in one session, ‘Why don’t we do a few scenarios, Jack?’

‘Let the “A” team be four points down with five to go and we will try and claw our way back or better still why don’t we be three points up with two to go and try and hold on to our lead?’ he suggested to O’Connor one evening.

‘I’ll give you a f ***** g scenario, Donaghy,’ grunted Jack.

‘Your man f **** d off up the field there and gave a pass that led to a goal. Now there is a scenario for you...’

We were all in stitches but, low and behold, Jack would introduce a few of those scenarios into training as time went on.

I also have no doubt that the phased full-court press on Stephen Cluxton in the 2016 All Ireland semifinal had Star’s basketball fingerprints all over it.

That intelligence, his ferocious competitiveness and his love of Kerry football means that someday Star could return to the scene in another guise.

Kieran Donaghy’s days of putting smiles on our Kerry faces might not be done just yet.

‘STAR, I DON’T WANT TO GET PERSONAL BUT YOU COULD USE A SHOWER’