N September 1, 2019 83 CHARLIE TALKS...

On his first meeting On I look him and I just go ‘Wow’. First time I remember when he I saw him, I wasn’t THEHILL! first came on the squad. that impressed. But He was always a very Deego was involved in efficient player. He management team and was reasonably said this guy is really, issues. He has everything you want as quick, wasn’t really, really good. And a midfielder.” overly quick. then I saw it in him and Of his heirs to the Hill throne, Paul He was small, I thought ‘oh my god Mannion and Con O’Callaghan, Red- technically mond speaks with equally generous what have we got very good. here?’ eloquence. A quiet “Mannion is just beautiful to watch. is the player, not best midfielder I’d Gets the ball underneath the Cusack the loudest Stand. He turns in on his left and ever seen. But Fenton splits the posts. He does it so often on the field, (inset) is better than you wonder why other teams don’t but never Mullins try to stop it. afraid to say and I never “Of course they are trying, he is just something if he thought so good that they can’t. His chasing felt it needed to be said. I’d ever back sets a new standard. He did it One thing you always got say that. again against Mayo, it reminded me from Jim (inset)... if he He’s the of that lung-busting chase back to was asked to do a job, he epitome of dispossess a Tyrone man in Omagh followed instructions to everything last year. a tee, he did that job. you’d ever “He has pace to burn. You some- Maybe that comes want to times wish he’d use that pace a little from his military/aviation see in a more and get in on goal. But he’s a joy background, where you footballer. to watch. A joy. had to do everything by And he’s modest, “Con reminded me an awful lot the book. He could play unassuming. He can of Jason in the way that he turned football. He had good catch the ball, play Keegan the last day. He’s a match vision, a lovely left foot. the ball, he can tackle. winner. He goes for the jugular But if you said to me that He doesn’t have any every time. the next two managers discipline issues. He has “If we get a chance and it is a drawn to win All- after everything you want as a “Telling her game with a minute to go, I’d want 1995 would be midfielder. him to go for the point, but I’d say and Jim, I would have put he’d nearly go for the goal. That’s you in a straitjacket. mother was the instinct in him. He’s just a born But what a job he match-winner. has done. What we are “Those two lads have the X factor, watching now, I don’t the hardest” they are box office. They have that think we’ll ever see again talent that you can’t buy, that you in our lifetime. can’t even develop. The talent those two guys have is not something you On professionalism can teach.” BOX OFFICE: Con His assessment of Cluxton is de- in the GAA and Paul livered as unambiguously as any Su- I’d hate to see preme Court verdict: “The greatest. professionalism coming On and MEMORIES: Just the greatest. A fantastic fella in to the GAA, but look legend and the lad who, through his skills, at the way it is going. Con O’Callaghan and All- changed the game forever. Legend.” You won’t be able to And the gavel falls. Those two lads have the winner Charlie have a job and play X factor, the box office. at inter-county level. Redmond Identity They have that talent Unfortunately, that’s the that you can’t buy, that If he suffered from anxiety as a way that it looks to me. I you can’t even teach. player, he’s a happy, shaky wreck as rue the day it happens. Mannion is beautiful a supporter. But we are on a ladder to watch, a joy. Con all-time greats. The colour of the day. The Hill in and we are not going to “They are doing things today that reminds me of Jayo. full flower. The sense of place and go back down the ladder. A born match-winner. we wouldn’t even dream of. Meeting identity. The wall of noise. The album We are going to keep the next day to go for baths, tone down Goes for the jugular of memories. Remembering when this going forward. We are every time. sessions. We went on the piss. We’d a was his playground. going to keep building up different cool-down session. It was “Ah, I get emotional. I do. All-Ire- the performance level. On his old Croker usually in Hanlon’s Corner on North land final day. The greatest Dublin Like you see the quality Circular Road.” team of all time. Special times. of the guys, the stature, Even if he loved the old ways – Mars pre-match routine “I get involved. I might throw a few the conditioning. It I used to always get sick Bars and sweets, the post Parnell Park Fs at the referee and opposition. But, wasn’t like that in our training meal – Charlie is no dinosaur in the dressing room. It generally, I think I’m a fair spectator. day. It is a different era, a just happened one day, I clinging to some golden Jurassic age. I applaud the opposition when they do different game. He has watched with awe and a deep got sick before the something good, give out when they match. I felt it cleared sense of pride as Gavin’s Rolls-Royce do something nasty.” On team brilliantly imposes itself on one Whatever happens, he’ll be in the me out and I was ready When I played with John to play. I didn’t vomit a summer after another, setting new Palace Bar on Fleet Street at Monday O’Leary, I thought I’d standards of excellence, uniting the city. lunchtime. Sipping a pint with Keith huge volume, it was just never see a goalkeeper to clear myself out. I’d “I look at Brian Fenton and I just Barr and a few old comrades. Feeling remotely as good. go ‘Wow’. First time I saw him, I the narcotic of the old days coursing have a little sleep for wasn’t that impressed. But Deego was He was a great shot- 10/15 minutes as well. wanted to talk through his veins. stopper, to them about involved in Jim’s management team Understanding nothing is forever Then get and he said ‘this guy is really, really, accurate with changed, in to the something that makes it so much more precious. his kick-outs, happened the really good’. And then I saw it in him Losing Grainne, watching his kids toilet get sick and and I thought ‘oh my God, what have he was a leader. I’d be ready to go. night before.” head off to university, adjusting to Then this fella The current we got here’? “the new normal”, has infused him I’d only touch the team leaves “His ability to catch the ball. His comes along. ball twice before with a wisdom he wishes he’d found He has changed him breathless. technique with either foot is bril- when he was younger. the game. One Their skills, ath- liant. He knows where to run. His free, one kick over “Football is important, hugely im- in a way no leticism, selfless- movement is exceptional. Mullins is portant in our lives, but it is not the the bar. They were ness, modesty and the best midfielder I’d ever seen. But most important. It is not the ultimate. player has ever things I had to do brilliance. And he’s better than Mullins and I never “If Dublin don’t win on Sunday, changed it. to make myself the easy class with thought I’d ever say that. we will all be broken-hearted. But The greatest. comfortable, to which they carry “A bit like Cluxton and O’Leary. nobody died. Legend. feel right. themselves. Special Never thought I’d see a better mid- “There’s people going to go into hos- footballers, special fielder in a Dublin jersey than Mul- pital on Monday to be told they have men. lins, but I have seen it with this guy. terminal cancer. People are going to ‘SPECIAL FOOTBALLERS, PINNACLE: The competitor in “He’s the epitome of everything be made homeless on Monday. him would love to you’d ever want to see in a footballer. “Football is a huge part of our lives. Charlie Redmond And he’s modest, unassuming. He can lifting Sam in 1995 test himself against It gives us so much. But there are SPECIAL MEN’ CHARLIE REDMOND Gavin’s platoon of tackle. He doesn’t have any discipline bigger things. Trust me.” 82THESeptember 1, 2019 DARLINGN OF

“WHATEVER happened? Where did it go? That mad blazing time when we swirled the stars in the sky.” – Joseph O’Connor, Shadowplay. HE wiwillll tatakkee his seat inin the Hogan Stand today and inhale ththee inincceensnsee of ththee colicoliseseum ththatat ususeded toto be hihiss playground. Where do the years go? Before CCoonn oorr Mannion oror Fento, bebeffoorere Bernard or DeDerrmmoo,, even bebeffoorere DuDubblliinn’’ss eternal goalkeeper rreewwrroottee tthhee old game’s woworrldld ororddeerr,, he was King ooff the Hill. Yes, BeBeffoorere ClCluuxxttoonn.. BC. Of ananootthheerr,, Neolithic age. A quarter ooff a century rapidly dissolv- ing and wasting away inin the pitiless, relentless waters of time. Days ofof thunder when ChaCharlie ReRedd-- mond wawass a bobonnddseservant to aann un- yielding prpree--mamatch routine. WhWheenn vomiting in tthhee ddrreesssising-room minutes before throw-in, emptying himself of anxiety, was the signal ththaatt he wwaass rereaaddyy.. The free-taking routine that was as chchoorereographed as RiRivveerrdd-- REMINISCING: ance: Three lliicckkss ooff his gloves, seven Charlie Redmond steps back aanndd ttwwoo toto his left, before with the Sunday launching the ball ininttoo perfect orbit. ThThee Michael Flatley. World’s Roy Curtis He ononllyy has to clcloossee hihiss eyeyeess and the river of memories bursts the banks of his mind. The four-game blockbuster against Meath, that suspended-reality summer of 1991, when, IN HIS PRIME: briefly, they were bigger than U2. The 1995 Dubs’ Redmond Dubs legend recalls the glory days in Blue All-Ireland final when he was sent off, but amid during the 1992 a blizzard of confusion, stayed on the field. When All-Ireland final he soldiered with Jayo and Curraner and Keith. versus Donegal And with a diminutive, hard, low-profile, and opens up on dealing with loss of wife hugely-driven footballer with a decent left-foot and the military instinct to quietly, meticulously follow orders. Even then, Jim Gavin preferred to operate from the shadows. Beaumont. She couldn’t even make liffe House, drink in the heady When Grainne, the lovely junior it up the stairs. atmosphere. nurse from Cavan that he, the city “I said to her ‘it is not worth your A Celtic nut, he’ll keep one eye firefighter, met in a maternity ward ROY CURTCURTIISS while going in here anymore, is it’? on the Old Firm game before, delivery room (“our eyes met across “And she said ‘no, it’s too hard’. At just as they did when they were a crowded umbilical cord”), his wife this stage, she had only six weeks, kings, himself and Deego will and mother of his three daughters, EXCLUSIVE two months left…” cut through the red-bricked was still alive. Redmond’s voice tails off. houses, join the throng bound In December 2016, three years for the palace of dreams. Fate arms, that’s not nice. The timeline is tattooed to Char- “When you get a four-year-old who lie’s soul: “She had the scan on a after being given 18 months, her “In our playing days, the team He sensed something might be is due to go back to South Africa Friday, they operated on Monday, youngest daughter still just 16, would meet in Croker 70 minutes wrong when Grainne started con- in three days and he gets knocked her birthday. On Wednesday, she Grainne lost her fight. before the All-Ireland final. fusing her words. down. And he’s going back in a cof- was told she had 18 months to live.” “Losing your wife changes you When you think about it,” Charlie “She would say fat instead of mat, fin. Those things don’t leave you. Grainne had a five centimetre hugely. In the prime of her life. It is is laughing now. small things. I didn’t pay too much When you are dealing with young tumour on her brain. hard to fathom. “Myself, Deego and Robbie Boyle notice.” children, it cuts into you.” “From that Friday to that Wednes- “To know from the start that this used to drive in to an All-Ireland final. Life as a firefighter On holidays in 2013, day, life just turned on its head. It was a fight we couldn’t win, that was Caught in crazy traffic. Deego had an had conditioned him his gut told him Grainne was horrendous. You don’t know the most difficult. It was devastating. aunt who lived on Fitzroy Avenue, beside the ground. So we would park against over-reaction, was in big trouble. The where you are. Where do I go, what Battle introduced him to the symptoms were stark: do I do, what’s to happen? there. At least we’d try. brutal cruelty of fate, Violent headaches, “You are trying to find a path. “But I had to be strong for every- “We got stopped regularly by the ingrained in him the confusion, co-ordina- How I am going to tell her parents, body. If I couldn’t be strong for cops at the barriers. The conversa- sense of detachment tion issues, knocking my parents? Initially, we didn’t tell Grainne and the kids then nobody tions were gas. without which it would over glasses. our parents and my mother and her could be. She had a huge journey she “‘We’re players, let us through.’ be impossible to do his They got an ear- father died not knowing. had to go through and she put up a “‘Right, Ted. Of course you are. job efficiently. ly flight home. “Her mother’s still alive, my father huge battle. I’d like to think that I You’re not the first to say that today. “Many times you He tuned into the has since passed. They had to be told helped her in that battle. You don’t think we are going to fall would be in a resuscita- GAA network, that as the end approached. They took it “But it was a battle we always knew for that one’. tion unit and the patient unfailing support very hard. Telling her mother was we were going to lose. ‘“F**k off lads. We are playing doesn’t make it. You’ve structure in crisis the hardest thing, that was the worst. “I’m not the first person this has in the All-Ireland final. Let us given them the best shot that is one of the “It was bad enough telling the happened to. I was very fortunate to through.’ and you have to walk Association’s tow- kids, but telling her mother, an old have met her. And very fortunate to “This was just over an hour before away. You have to. lie’s wife ering strengths. woman…Jaysus…” have spent a lot of time with her. My throw-in. It was mad, chaotic, but I TRAGIC: Char wouldn’t swap it for the world. “A couple of cases I ne just before He rang Gerry Grainne fought heroically, but that youngest kid, Ruth, only had her for Grain McEntee, his old infernal, rapacious disease would “Compared to now. Everything walked away from in e passed away 16 years.” tears. They all involved sh Meath rival and not be denied. Today, he’ll travel in from his home organised with military precision. kids. I still remember them, the day master surgeon. An MRI scan was “She was getting chemo every in Ashbourne with Mick Deegan, A police escort to the door of the of the week, the location. They don’t arranged. Soon David Hickey, ’70s second week. It got to the stage both an Erin’s Isle and Dublin team- dressing-room. leave you. Ever. legend, living saint, surgeon, was where she couldn’t even get up to mate and his brother-in-law. They’ll “The only time the police chased “When a 12-year-old dies in your by their side. the chemo ward on the third floor of have a pre-match pint in the Clon- after one of our guys was when they