Dunno if anyone posted this.
The mind is willing and at 40, the body is as well
Enda McEvoy
Heading into his 11th Wexford county decider, that kind of endurance comes naturally to Liam Dunne as he talks about a career blessed with final moments
Born to hurl: Oulart’s Liam Dunne attributes his longevity to good and sensible training Being Liam Dunne. It’s Wednesday night last and he’s at home working out on an exercise bike and casting an interested eye over Arsenal versus Spurs on Sky Sports as he tries to get fit for his 11th – not including replays – Wexford county final. He’s trying to get fit because three days earlier he went up for a ball with Paul Codd in the semi-final, got caught under the Rathnure man coming down and jarred his knee on landing. Dunne didn’t feel too bad that night; on Monday, however, it was as though he “had three knees”.
Since then he’s had hot water, cold water, seawater, done the cryotherapy thing in White’s Hotel and pounded the pedals on his bike. Will he make the Oulart the Ballagh line-up against St Martin’s today? Well, put it this way: last year Dunne broke his finger a few days before the county final, had pins inserted and was told he hadn’t a chance of playing. He played and came away with a sixth medal. Being Liam Dunne.
He’s a midfielder these days, in case you didn’t know. The senior partner alongside David Redmond in chronological terms, very much the junior partner in practical terms. Redmond, a real box-to-box merchant, does the running; Dunne, as befits someone of his age and venerability, hangs around and picks up the bits and pieces. At one stage in the quarter-final against Faythe Harriers, Dunne let a roar at the sideline to bring in some water. The water man rushed on and was making a beeline for Dunne when he was waved away.
“No, not me – it’s for Redmond. Look at all the running he’s done!”
Redmond, according to Dunne, is “a gazelle”; Dunne neither pretends nor attempts to be. “I never had any speed to begin with. But you try and use the bit of brains that you have.”
That’s what he’s been doing at midfield since Oulart put him in there a year ago. Life begins at 40, the age Dunne turned in June, then? “Lose on Sunday and it could end there too.” He’s well aware that the clich about being only as good as one’s last game has particular relevance in his case. “I could play nine good matches out of 10. Play a bad one and fellas will say, ‘Sure in his heyday he couldn’t play at midfield.’”
Part of the credit for his winter of content he attributes to Kevin Ryan, the Oulart manager and former Waterford selector. Ryan placed Dunne on a training programme drawn up by Gerry Fitzpatrick and different to the regime practised by the other players. Dunne did his block of heavy work early in the season and was then handed a four-month break in which he wasn’t required to show up in the field at all. He didn’t object, seeing that at his age he “can’t be doing the same training as everyone else”. It’s the little things he does off the field, he’s discovered, that make the difference, such as the trips to take the waters at Curracloe or Morris Castle. The little things he wouldn’t have done in his prime. Then again, recovery wasn’t the issue that it is now.
Not that this old dog has learned any new tricks at midfield, it seems. “At 40, you hurl to survive. Nothing more.” One trick from his previous life, however, has been consigned firmly to the past. “I don’t be hitting anyone any more. I gave that up when I retired from intercounty.” Anybody mention that hat-trick of championship red cards (John Troy 2000, Brian O’Meara '01, Martin Comerford '02) these days, Liam? “An odd time it’s thrown at me, but not from anybody on the field. I was expecting something to be said when I went back in '03 but it never happened. Which was kind of nice.”
He’ll continue to pay out the thread for as long as it lasts. Today marks his fifth county final in succession since he finished up with Wexford in 2003. He’d like to think that he’s held his own in that time. He’s simultaneously appreciative of his good luck. “Some lads never get the opportunity to appear in a county final. Some might get one chance. I count myself really, really fortunate.” Similar sentiments apply to his role in the county’s year of liberty, 1996. “It’s only in time, as it goes by, and you see Wexford in the doldrums, that you realise we were damn lucky to get '96 out of it. Looking back, I’m more relieved than anything else. The 1968 team are being presented to the crowd at the county final. To think we were part of the only Wexford team to win an All Ireland in 40 years is frightening.”
He’s been fortunate too, he asserts, to have spent the last two years as a Wexford minor selector although he’s quick to add, unprompted, that the management “made a balls of it” when Galway were reduced to 13 men in the All Ireland quarter-final at Semple Stadium in July. When the first chap was sent off, Wexford employed the spare man in defence. When the second chap was sent off, they employed the second spare man in defence. Aargh. “A complete waste of time. Okay, there was only a minute or two left, and these things are easy to say in hindsight, but we should have pushed one of our spare men forward. The one thing I’ll say is that the commitment from the players was fantastic and that after a disappointing Leinster final they came back and redeemed themselves against Galway.”
The Meyler affair, by the by? Being Liam Dunne, he has an opinion on that. “It was badly handled. It was wrong t hat the county board fired him. Shouldn’t have happened.” Being Liam Dunne.
November 2, 2008