Keith Duggan: Kerry versus Dublin is the stuff of legend and more than any bitter rivalry

Polish and shine the Spire, rinse the Liffey through with Fairy Liquid, deck the pubs with the sky blue, the green and gold bunting and turn the radio dial to 1977. It’s Dublin versus Kerry and so the city (the nation!) must fall under its spell as the avenues turn gold-tinted in the warm light of nostalgia, old accomplishments and stories, stories, stories.

Yes, Dublin versus Kerry is the key rivalry in Irish national sport. It’s a cult. It’s a fables-factory. But it is the ascendancy too. Between them they have been appearing in All-Ireland finals for 103 years and counting. They’ve held the Sam Maguire for 67 years. They are the teenager hogging the mirror in the bathroom- forever. And they like it that way just fine.

It’s not their fault. It’s their duty to preserve this thing now. Dublin versus Kerry as we know it was just a happy accident of circumstance and the unnatural energy and forensic ambition of certain key men – Kevin Heffernan in Marino, Mick O’Dwyer conniving in Waterville – and maybe it helped too that the ground was beginning to shift underneath the stifling conservatism of de Valera’s Ireland. Run through the old documentaries and films of the 1970s teams – and when it comes to lovingly crafted film and written tributes, Dublin versus Kerry can keep company with the Beatles and the Stones –- and you are struck by the louche glamour of the teams.

And it caught so many of the prevailing opposites. The Game was and remains an invitation to the rest of the country to sit back and enjoy an elemental battle between town and country, between the urban versus the wild. The counties were drawn to one another. Do Dubs holiday anywhere in Ireland besides the unblemished shores of the Dingle peninsula? And what Kerry man or woman does not have a Joycean mental map of the side streets and alleys which guarantees the fly parking spot close to Croke Park?

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Kerry have the bragging rights of 37 titles. And Kerry has the voice in Mícheál Ó Muircheartaigh’s entrancing radio commentaries that rumble through the GAA tradition like a gorgeous night train. But then Dublin too has the voice in the staccato excitement of television‘s Michael O’Hehir. And Dublin soon may have the titles too, with 30 now. It’s getting closer all the time.

Joe Brolly likes to tell the story of a phone call he got from David Hickey, a former Dublin star who is a living god to more than Brolly. Hickey wanted to tell him that he was in a pub watching some television tangent of bespectacled passion delivered by Brolly. And that there had been a standing ovation. And where was this pub? In the heart of Kerry. Yes, roam through the best hostelries in the Kingdom on silvery summer nights and you won’t be long bumping into this or that fabled Dub star, often in the company of old Kerry foes. And the Kerry-ites are no strangers to the capital; a few of them have even been moved to live there.

As for friendships? Former Kerry chairman Seán Walsh has told the great story about breakfasting – at the invitation of Páidí Ó Sé – with Charles J Haughey in Kinsealy, if you don’t mind. CJH hobbling into the room on crutches and inquiring of his friend, “Páidí, did you ever break any bones in your career?” And Páidí flashing back, with the disarming smile, “ah no….well, none of my own.”

They are quick to claim another. In Kerry they’ll insist that all the Brogans are Kingdom players who got away. They’ll reflect on this with a hint of sadness – for the Brogans.

Any Kerry youngster aged six or older will caution you that the only reason the Dubs won the ‘42 All-Ireland was because they had two Dingle men playing midfield.

Or that when they met in the 1923 final, Kerry refused to play until one of their men was released from prison. When the GAA moved to award the title to Dublin, they refused to accept it. The Kerry man was released. The match was played. The Dubs won!

If it’s true that the authenticity of the rivalry stretched the limits of reason from around 1988 to 2011 because Kerry kept winning, it is also true that neither county was willing to give up on the romance of the idea. For those who remembered the real thing, it was just too important. For those too young, it was an inheritance.

The past decade has given the new millennials a sense of the electrifying nature of those 1970s tussles, when all other counties were reduced to a support cast and audience. Except now Dublin have become an out-and-out torment, crashing the speed of sound with six All-Irelands in a row and leaving the Kingdom’s custodians vexed and anxious and – whisper it – desperate to set the world to rights with a big win – or any old win – over the Dubs.

It won’t ever show up on census charts or economical data but there’s a reasonable argument to be made that this rivalry played a significant role in shaping what contemporary Dublin is; that those 1970s television Sundays helped the GAA run a chord through the disparate suburbs to pull the city closer together.

And there is no question that the Kerry football seasons have helped to form the rhythm of the calendar year in the Kingdom; that they offer a light through the November blackness.

And it is circular. You can see it in the ambling gait that James McCarthy inherited from his auld fellah or in the powerful video phone footage of the late Anton O’Toole – the Blue Panther, Jim Gavin’s football idol – stopping on a Christmas night on Grafton Street to listen to Glen Hansard sing Raglan Road just a few years ago. And it is written in the recurring surnames that glitter through Kerry teams: Moran, Spillane, Egan. It’s family tree stuff.

So, Saturday night and from the city duke box sounds you’ll hear Phil singing about crackin’ up and Ronnie Drew as the night turns mellow and streets will be awash with jerseys from both counties. It’s their city for the weekend; Gaelic football’s ruling class.

It’s as well for the rest that the reality often eclipses the best of the fables and that when these two meet, the electrons flow. Kerry versus Dublin is a fraternity by now more than any bitter rivalry. But still. Once the ball is in the air it is the real thing.