‘We stand for the anthem, buoyant and tribal, heart beating with heart, our colours brave, our faces turned towards the uncertain sun’
have been a beautiful thing to behold over the last 12 days. Ireland’s successes have been thrilling, bold statements of power by brilliant, focused, athletes. And after the pinnacle has been reached, they get to live the moment they’d probably dreamed about their entire lives, as they face the flag and hear Amhrán na bhFiann being played.
For him, and Rhys McClenaghan, and Kellie Harrington, and Paul O’Donovan and Fintan McCarthy, hearing that song is a culmination of a lifetime’s work. It symbolises reaching the global pinnacle. “Then, one by one, the crowd disappears into the song, into the moment. And then, in the last moments of the poem:
In that moment 10 days ago, as the All-Ireland football final began, the national anthem was a chance for Galway and Armagh people to recognise that they’d made it this far. After months of striving on the field, after weeks of ticket worries and familial strife and flights booked, you were inside the building, and ready to let the game take you where it would.
For the men’s footballers the week before, the regrets will last a lifetime. To have played so poorly, to have missed so many chances, and yet still to end the game a width of a post from extra time, was indicative of how little had to change to give the whole winter and spring in Galway an entirely different texture.
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