What might have been.
Johnny Doyle has already gone down as one of the all-time Kildare greats. He’s still a household name in Ireland, he’s still an inspiration to younger generations.
But, if it wasn’t for Mick O’Dwyer, Doyle would never have won a Leinster championship.
It was the Kerry great, of course, who led the Lilywhites to their last two provincial successes. In 1998, he took them the whole way to the All-Ireland final only to be pipped by a serious Galway outfit and, in 2000, he guided them to Leinster again. Whilst Meath, Westmeath and Laois (under Micko obviously) all had their share of provincial success since, Kildare have never reached those heights again.
Johnny Doyle would’ve been discovered sooner or later but, with a man with his slight frame coming into a game increasingly placing more and more emphasis on strength, it probably took a pure footballing visionary like O’Dwyer to fast-track the forward into the county team.
In 2000, Doyle made his breakthrough and, in 2000, he had his only championship success with his county – one which he richly, richly deserved, even if he paid his dues later.
It wasn’t like it was an obvious decision for O’Dwyer to call up the youngster though. As Doyle put it himself, most people thought that the manager had lost the plot.
As what usually happened, O’Dwyer’s instincts and his risks paid out 10-fold.
#micko give me my start when most thought he'd lost the plot. I'll alway be be greatful and honored that I got the opertuniity to have learned from #thegreatest.
— John Doyle (@johnnydoyle78) January 8, 2018
Mick’s army camp at The Curragh was renowned and despised at the same time in Kildare.
Up and down that thankless hill he’d make the county hopefuls run until they couldn’t run no more. They lost a lot of men along the way but, when it boiled down to it, the manager was left with players he wanted to work with. Players he could trust. Men who would go the distance.
That’s why his reason for doing all those runs made perfect sense even when sports science was telling him that it wasn’t the optimal thing to do.
O’Dwyer knew that. But he also knew how to win.
After all the years I’m still soft and pudgy. Great man and great documentary #oncesoftandpudgyalways
— Eoin Liston (@EoinListon) January 8, 2018
