It is half a century today since Dublin’s breakthrough All-Ireland win under Kevin Heffernan.
You recognise the date and you count back. To a time when a city and the country was a very different place. To a time when a sport was well established for almost 100 years, but nonetheless was steeped in antiquity and took some dragging into modernity.
Before you think of 1974, you have to trace the story back another 19 years. To a time when the Dubs struck out on their own journey. There was an insane level of interest. This being the 1950’s, British Rail had to put on extra trains to Holyhead with thousands returning home from London. The platform at Euston Station became overcrowded at one stage with returning exiles.Dublin, or rather ‘The Dubs’, were on their way. Heffernan was the on-pitch leader, the corner-forward who would pop up in the Team of the Century and later the Team of the Millennium.
The purists were unhappy. There was too much solo running. Too much fisting points and to each other. None of that concerned Heffernan. Watching it back now, the football played has the jarring elements that can strike anyone used to today’s game. Anton O’Toole for example produces a lovely sidestep to evade a tackle, but just before it, gets away with an ugly solo, before a jerky fisted point.
Instead, Keaveney delivered a flighted, soccer-style ‘cross’ which Bobby Doyle gets a fist to, sending it over the bar.The turning point, such as it was, came with a missed penalty at the Canal End. By this stage, those on Hill 16 have made their way to the back of the goal. Sometime at the start of the second half a Garda cordon had formed.
1974 And All That Dublin Galway The Dubs
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