What could these lads possibly have to improve on now?
They’ve just won four All-Ireland finals in a row, Sunday’s one, their most convincing yet. Next year, the Dubs will begin their quest for a fifth in succession – that a feat that has never been accomplished in either hurling or football at a senior level to date.
They’re 1/2 to rewrite history to drive for five in 2019 and with the bookies generally unerring in their judgement, and the simple fact that no other football team in the country looks to be even remotely close to where Jim Gavin’s men are now, it would be a huge surprise if they don’t re-write history next year.
What has to be seen as the main reason this Dublin team have gone on to win so relentlessly and so ruthlessly, where a number of other teams have faltered after one, two wins in a row, is their focus, their ability not to get carried away with anything, even reaching the holy grail.
Men like Ciaran Kilkenny and Dean Rock called Sunday the best day of their lives, while James McCarthy was pumped up in his post-match interview, but it was a contribution from Philly McMahon which revealed the true colours of this Dublin team.
https://www.instagram.com/p/BnO29bin0JH/?taken-by=deanorock
https://www.instagram.com/p/BnO0RL-gcKb/?taken-by=ckkilkenny93
Because even on the night of their fourth triumph, in the middle of their celebratory banquet, McMahon was already thinking about next year, he was already thinking about how he and this team can improve.
It may indeed have been the best day of these lads’ lives but where others allow it become the best week, and month of their lives, you just know these lads won’t go over the top for too long.
“We didn’t have a total performance we still have plenty of things to work on,” said Philly to Marty Morrissey.
@MartyM_RTE is with Paul Mannion and Philly McMahon as the four-in-a-row All-Ireland champions get the party started #RTEgaa pic.twitter.com/e0QKCc1MYh
— RTÉ GAA (@RTEgaa) September 2, 2018
And that’s the one criticism that has been levelled at them over the last few years. That they don’t show enough emotion, that their outrageously driven mindset doesn’t allow them to bask in the glory of the achievement that they’d all probably dreamed of as kids growing up.
When does it actually become enough? When does this pursuit for perfection end, many ask.
This shouldn’t really be delivered as a criticism though, surely? Isn’t it more a compliment to these men’s unbelievable professionalism that they’re so ambitious and so insatiable that they just want more and more of it.
It’s delivered as a back-handed compliment though. Donal Óg Cusack famously dubbed Kilkenny’s four-in-a-row-winning hurlers as the ‘Stepford Wives’ in his autobiography Come What May.
What the Cork man was getting at was that the men of Kilkenny were perfect in their execution but that they were robotic as a result of that. That they didn’t really enjoy all of this successes and lost sight of the most important thing – enjoying it all.
But the Kilkenny lads and the Dublin lads will say that their time in their county jerseys are short, that they can look back with pride when they’ve hung up the boots. Some think that’s too late though, some thing you have to enjoy it there and then.
There are no rights and no wrongs because everybody has different attitudes to things, but the Dublin lads seem to be fairly justified right now.
