No basis for claims Dublin are facing the end of an era
Reaction to surprise quarter-final defeat to Galway ignores the reality
Sport loves labels. Crunch game, make-or-break season, winner takes all, Super Sunday. Plus, of course, end of an era. In many cases, the descriptions wildly differ from the reality. If you were to heed the hype, lots of games have more crunch than Kellogg’s Crunchy Nut when quite often they aren’t nearly as important as the billing suggests.
Make or break? It gives the impression that unless a specific year yields riches, a bleak future lies ahead. By the start of the new season, the grim predictions are forgotten as fresh hope returns. Winner takes all? Sometimes yes, but not always. Super Sunday? A marketing ploy by Sky.
And so to ‘end of an era’, the star turn in the Grim Reaper’s academy of analysis. It has been on a repetitive loop since last Saturday, solemnly asserting Dublin’s defeat by Galway holds more significance than merely eliminating the reigning champions from the title race.
Instead, it’s being presented as a defining development for Dublin football, bringing a prolonged period of success to an end.
I find it all quite strange. It wasn’t as if Dublin suffered a catastrophic implosion, wiped out on all fronts by mid-ranking opposition. Instead, they lost by the odd score of 33 to rivals who contested the All-Ireland final two years ago and were unbeaten in seven championship games this season.
Claiming Dublin face an uncertain future after losing to top-class opposition is straight from the playbook which holds that the last game is the most accurate indicator of a team’s true status.
In this case, it’s also insulting to Galway, suggesting Dublin had slipped so far they were ripe for the plucking. Could it not have been a case of Galway rising to Dublin’s level?
And what would have happened if Con O’Callaghan had equalised from that late chance and Dublin won in extra time? The analysis would have centred exclusively on how they deployed their experience and grit to work through a difficult situation; a sign of true champions, etc.
Anguish
Instead, O’Callaghan’s kick went astray, Dublin lost and suddenly they’re a spent force, facing end-of-anera anguish.
Strangely, there was no such commentary when they lost to Mayo in the 2021 semi-final, even if it was the game that ended their lengthy dominance. Their record-breaking run had ended with six successive titles, something unlikely to be achieved again. That was indeed the end of an era.
Even when Dublin lost to Kerry in the 2022 semi-final there was no talk of difficult days ahead. Quite right, too. A year later, they were All-Ireland champions again.
So why is it so different now? Why is there an end-of-an-era consensus, based on the narrowest of defeats? Frankly, I have no idea, other than there’s always a tendency to predict trouble when a long-time empire is not quite as dominant as it once was.
It happened to the great Kerry team of the 1970s/80s after they lost to Offaly in the 1982 All-Ireland final and to Cork in the 1983 Munster final (by a point in both cases).
Conventional wisdom decreed the glory cycle had ended and an extensive rebuilding task lay ahead over the next few years. Instead, Kerry returned with much the same team in 1984, won the All-Ireland and completed another three-in-a-row in 1986.
There were end-of-an-era whispers too about the Kilkenny hurlers when their All-Ireland five-in-a-row ambitions were smashed by Tipperary in 2010.
Premier county domination was boldly predicted – especially when the U-21s won the All-Ireland a week later – but it didn’t happen. They didn’t win their next All-Ireland title until 2016; by then, Kilkenny had added four more in 2011-12-14-15.
Dublin went into Saturday’s game as All-Ireland favourites; by 8pm, they were being portrayed as a mixture of past-it oldies, a younger group whose motivation had been dimmed by so much success and a bench populated by modest talents.
Hence the gloomy predictions for the future.
And yet, when the 2025 All-Ireland odds are compiled after the final later this month, Dublin will be among the top three favourites. But then bookies deal in fact, not emotion. Any wonder why they make fortunes?
Dublin’s personnel will change to a degree, but there’s enough quality to keep them competitive.
Opposition would be advised to ignore the end-of-an-era assertions.