Special train, special game The journeys to and from Dublin were almost as memorable as the match Sketch Daniel Carey A FEW eyebrows were raised when it was announced on Thursday night that Midwest Radio would be giving away tickets for Sunday’s Westport-Dublin train. Yet while match tickets did the rounds on Saturday night, places on Iarnród Éireann’s special train were at a premium. By the time the ‘special’ made its penultimate stop at Ballyhaunis, offering train tickets – paid for or free – was looking like a piece of foresight worthy of Mickey Harte.
This reporter snapped up one of the last remaining seats on the ‘special’ around lunchtime on Saturday with the aid of a woman for whom All-Ireland weekend was becoming all too much. “I’m going to shoot someone before the day is out,” she mused as the queue got longer and the ’phone kept ringing, but I, for one, managed to get out of there alive.
There was a whiff of disappointment in some quarters that getting the ‘special’ meant boarding a non-Inter City vehicle. But one Castlebar passenger was delighted that we were going to travel on what she called ‘the really old, rickety, orange trains’, and at least it meant we were spared bilingual announcements every 15 seconds, a staple of the ‘new’ trains most could do without.
No trolley service, then, but a shop, which eventually appeared like an oasis in the desert as another long queue snaked its way forward. “Is that a baby-changing place next to the shop?” one young woman wondered. “Does that mean a place where you can change your baby for a new one?” asked her friend, who’s clearly a stranger to nappies.
As we got closer to Dublin, plans were being put in place for breakfasts and (among those with tougher constitutions) pints. “Where’s your ticket for?” one man bellowed into his mobile phone before adding the killer line. “The Nally Stand? Isn’t that in Tyrone?” Having brought the news to his group that ‘Tony’s in the Nally Stand’, his equally quick-witted friend commented sardonically: “He’s hardly there now, is he? It’s not even half ten!”
It was 10.35am when the blowing of an air-horn prompted a rousing rendition of the first verse of ‘The Green and Red of Mayo’, and there were further noisy exhibitions of county pride as the group disembarked at Heuston, where a drum was produced. Non-football people in the train station looked bemused, and the old Wellington line ‘I don’t know what effect these men will have upon the enemy, but by God, they frighten me’ came to mind for some.
‘St Patrick’ (AKA John Durkan from Westport) added a spiritual dimension to the gathering on the LUAS platform, but the identity of another individual caused confusion on the tram. “Michael Nestor was on the train,” one young man commented, prompting a wonderful game of Chinese whispers. “Michael Lyster from RTÉ?” somebody a few seats up wondered aloud. “No, Michael NESTOR from Ballintubber,” came the response from the fella beside him. “Isn’t he from Ballyhaunis?” piped up another individual. “He played for Mayo in ’96 and ’97, that lad!”
The exact status of Louisburgh was the subject of discussion among a group from Castlebar. One gave it a wonderfully Narnia-esque definition – ‘a different world’. “Yeah, there’s nothing there,” a second suggested. “That’s not true, there’s a Staunton’s Pharmacy there,” countered a third. “God, there’s a Staunton’s Pharmacy everywhere” was the memorable reply.
The crowds swelled as we got closer to Drumcondra. Tyrone were out in force, and it was just the men who were wearing false beards in honour of the hairiest team in modern sport – ah, the wonders of face-paint. Almost all of those enquiring about tickets were looking to acquire rather than offload them, but one woman under the railway bridge held up a protest-style placard which read: ‘Ticket for sale – 1 Cusack for 2 Hill’. The mobile phone was the weapon of choice for most wannabe horse-traders. “They have a Davin, and they’d swap it for two Hill if they could,” one woman told her handset more in hope than confidence.
Going down Clonliffe Road, we met a mother and son from Tyrone coming in the other direction. “”So where’s Quinn’s?” asked the boy, who clearly realised that this information was vital to his chances of securing a ticket. “It must be here somewhere,” the woman replied. Croke Park virgins, surely?
We wouldn’t be going to Quinn’s for the minor game today. “It’s fierce warm,” this reporter said to Billy Fitzpatrick, but broadcaster Jimmy Magee begged to differ. “It’s always cold out there,” he warned, pointing a finger in the direction of the Tower of Babel that is the Upper Hogan. Reaching for my jacket ten minutes into the second half of the minor game, I had to concede that the ‘memory man’ was right on this one.
So, Mayo might have won but in the end had to settle for a draw after a magnificent game. We got the thoughts of Ray Dempsey, who had to compete to be heard above the Presidential salute and ‘The Star Of The County Down’. Making our way back into the media lift, Michael Gallagher, Kevin Moran, Colm Gannon and I were joined by an eight-year-old in a Kerry jersey. Journalists seem to be getting younger and younger these days,
And, perhaps, less informed too. One statement by a Kerry reporter to a Tyrone counterpart during the first half – “Yeah, they’re brothers … It’s pronounced Thum-aaaaws” – will long live in the memory. When it was all over, Tyrone were champions, and all over the field. The big screen’s safety message – Plan B – was the only official acknowledgement that a pitch invasion had occurred.
Coming up Frederick Street afterwards, one member of the losing tribe was adamant if incoherent. “Killian Young I would have given man of the match to, lads – if he was Kerry”, she said to no-one in particular. The queue for the LUAS in Abbey Street was around the block, so there was nothing for it but to secure a taxi driver with local knowledge.
Though this reporter ended up in a quiet carriage, there was a fair level of high jinks on the way home. A girl was doing cartwheels in front of the shop, using the crush barrier as a vault. God knows how she’d have celebrated if Mayo had won.
We arrived into Westport 15 hours after we had set out. One guy demanded that his friends watch him do a slow motion run reminiscent of ‘Baywatch’ (which, like most men who hit adolescence in the 1990s, I only watched for the articles). Ye won’t admit to remembering this, but the first line of the theme tune to that show was: “Some people stand in the darkness, afraid to step into the light”. Mayo are well and truly out of the shadows now. Time to finish the job.
