Maurice Brosnan: We endure an All-Ireland final like this because of all that football can give
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Hold on tight. Make ready for a white-knuckle ride. The wild swirl of jubilation that swept across Croke Park came like a dam break. A heaving sea of fervour had built up over the course of 70 excruciating minutes, of two crazed weeks, of 22 long years.
There is a tortured supporter high in the Hogan Stand. No one knows his creed, the cold started to descend during the final quarter and a jacket engulfs his colours. It is all about the bleachers right now. That passage, indeed most of the second half, was defined by impactful substitutes.
Stefan Campbell brought unanswerable speed and immaculate timing to burst off Ben Crealey’s shoulder and send Aaron McKay free. Oisín O’Neill was awesome. His booming point with five minutes left proved to be Armagh’s last of the contest. Then the screw initiated its turn, fists began to clench, and the man in level seven looked for a concrete bolster.
His hands are welded to the rail in a plea and a prayer. This is what Gaelic football can do. It can take a blazing sellout, a stadium that seemed to sway when Armagh broke from the parade in front of a flare-bestrewn Hill 16, and completely stifle it. A turgid first half took the oxygen from the fire.
Initially it looked liable to live up to its showpiece billing. Point for point. A potential short effort by Paul Conroy, the most dangerous shot in modern Gaelic football, crept over. Oisín Conaty tore the right flank with raging elusiveness. Then he did it again. And again. And again. He scored 0-3, he created Ben Crealey’s second score only after slipping on scorched earth. Robert Finnerty laid on for Liam Silke, pressed the subsequent kickout and earned his own converted free. Here we go.
Then football did what it can do. It struck Finnerty down, forcing him off after 11 minutes. It produced the last thing a tie like this needs, successive poor wides. Aidan Forker and Damien Comer and a Conor Turbitt free all went wayward. Suddenly the hold is releasing, no one is reaching for steel stress relievers now, half of the ground seems more preoccupied with the fortunes of an incapacitated seagull.
Why do we endure this? Come the close, it’s a whole other level of suffering. Suffocating. The figure squirming in his seat is all of us. Listen closely. Can you hear that sound beneath the buzz of an All-Ireland final? This place is starting to creak.
Armagh have a gnawing sense of dread. Galway have worse: fleeting hope. A three-point lead is sliding away. Céin D'Arcy, two. Cillian McDaid, one. As close as it gets. Roll out every cliché imaginable about fine margins and it still won’t capture the extent of it. Galway’s final shot to draw level clips the post and drops wide. That is the game.
For all of the new contenders' blossoming, for a city in saturation with a magnificent crimson, for all it was a bright and fresh and rich final, ultimately it was black and white. The better squad took their chances and finished as champions. Simple. 26 shots to 19. Armagh’s clinical edge, their inclination to kick a tad more than their opponents, the sole goal, was the difference. Galway’s response to that green flag was to hit one point from five consecutive misses. In any sport, such wastefulness has a cost.
That is what decided the game, not why we indulge it. The reason everyone embraces all that Gaelic football can take is because of what it can give too. Moan about the show all we like, sure doesn’t it belong to us, but for the same reason we will never abandon it.
Gaelic football is the venom and the antidote. In the face of unimaginable hardship, all a person can do is double the dose. McGeeney persisted despite all kinds of stinging rebukes. He knows how it goes. It was immense inner belief that saw him break the mould as a player. The same hard road had to be journeyed as a manager.
“He continues to lead this county from the sideline every single day of his life,” declared victorious captain Aidan Forker as he stood before Sam Maguire.
“Challenging and supporting us in every way possible. I mean every way. This win today, I promise you, would not have happened if Geezer did not return ten years ago. It is a long time coming.”
We will probably hear a lot about how a side that fell short so many times changed in the coming days. Nothing changed. They triumphed because that conviction did not waiver, their competitiveness was ever present. The fundamental law of averages meant eventually some rival would slip on the home straight. Galway did.
It exudes from him to them. Oisín O’Neill, who squandered a late opportunity to down Kerry in the semi-final, comes back for more and sticks a monster score after already creating one for Niall Grimley.
O’Neill is one of several Armagh panellists who have been touched by tragedy recently. He and his brother Rian buried their uncle Pádraig O’Neill on Wednesday. It is wrong to say that all of that puts Sunday into perspective. It shouldn’t take death’s brutal arrival to do so.
What Gaelic football does provide is the platform. A conduit. Post-match O’Neill can pay tribute to his uncle. He can arrive for the post-match press conference wearing a 'Care for Caolan' t-shirt, a nod to his Crossmaglen club-mate who is currently battling cancer.
It can allow Niall Grimley to dedicate the victory to his late brother Patrick, a 40-year-old father of three killed in a car crash last November. “There is not a minute goes by where I don't think about him,” he told RTÉ afterwards. "That was for him and I just wish he was here to see it.”
Gaelic football can be the fuel for nightmares. Gaelic football can be the source of dreams. That nearby fan disappeared in the bedlam of the final whistle. We’ve no idea if he headed away in celebration or commiseration. Regardless of his reaction to the result, all we know is what brought him here and what will bring him back.