Full coverage: Dublin GAA

In Dublin, we saw the provincials as a way of charting our journey. One more step towards the All-Ireland but they were steps for ourselves in preparing for the epic games to come. By the end, the provincial final in Leinster had no other meaning. 

This week, GAA people have been talking about the club that issued a players’ charter with a string of demands. It is a nonsense. There are ways to test and build character amongst groups without creating an environment built on fear. 

In a club match this year, I fractured my skull, eye socket, and nose. The doctors said it was like something they would see from a road accident. But it also made me realise that I was wrong to criticise the GAA for splitting the season. The club is the centre of it all.

Stephen Cluxton’s football IQ is on a different level to anyone I ever played with which always added rich insight in preparation for shutting out an opposition’s attacking threat or breaking down a packed defence.

From a psychological point of view, as you get older the willingness to keep growing and operating at a sustained high level in an amateur sport becomes intolerable.

There is a lot to look forward to in the new GAA season, new managers, new structures and more personalities.

Brian Mullins was a four-time All Ireland winner, an imposing man to face in competitive battle and the hardest of taskmaster’s as a coach but he valued participation above competition during his time as Director of Sport at UCD and it may be where he made the greatest mark of all.

The time a team can find between stimulus and response is the key to managing a big game like Dublin-Kerry. It is the real challenge for Kerry this weekend.

Mayo are driven by a fanbase that is desperate for success but despite repeated failures, their expectations remain high. Paul Flynn has seen at first hand how relentless that craving can be.

The four provincial finals in Gaelic football this weekend will demonstrate the evolution of Gaelic football and how anarchy has given way to organised chaos.