The ties that bind. Pádraig Ó Sé has his All-Ireland medal now. An Ghaeltacht have their medal. And Kerry have another couple of All-Ireland football titles to heap on the mountain top.
It certainly wasn’t a day for football purists at Croke Park on Sunday but nonetheless it finished with Ballymacelligott as All-Ireland junior club champions and An Ghaeltacht as intermediate winners.
And while the football was forgettable, it was yet another memorable day for one of the GAA’s most storied families.
In the final 10 minutes of the intermediate decider, a high mis-hit ball dropped dangerously in front of the An Ghaeltacht goal but from within the forest of bodies below emerged Pádraig Ó Sé, number five on his back, with possession, spinning away and clearing the danger. The cut of Páidí about him.
“I’m sure my dad would be very proud looking down,” said Pádraig. “And I’m sure he’d have really soaked up the atmosphere in Dublin tonight as well, he’d be loving it. Yeah, it’s special to bring one [All-Ireland medal] back.”
His dad, the legendary Páidí Ó Sé, won eight All-Ireland senior medals with Kerry. Páidí’s nephews also collected their fair share – Darragh (six), Tomás (five) and Marc (five). But none of them managed to win a club All-Ireland.
The trio of brothers played in the 2004 All-Ireland senior club final when An Ghaeltacht lost to Caltra by a point. Another sibling, Feargal, was player-manager 22 years ago. Two decades later, he was on the sideline with the bainisteoir bib at Croke Park again on Sunday.
Pádraig Ó Sé helping An Ghaeltacht to All-Ireland club redemption. Photograph: James Lawlor/Inpho
“When that happened [in 2004], it was the end of the world for us,” said the An Ghaeltacht manager. “It was absolutely devastating at the time, and it stuck with me personally for a very long time.
“As we say in Irish it’s slánú, redemption, for us because now our club has an All-Ireland.”
As for the game itself, it might already have sewn up the “Worst Croke Park game of 2026″ award because it is hard to imagine there will be a more insipid encounter at the venue this year. Glenullin seemingly came with a rather curious and brave strategy to not really play any football.
The Derry champions defended deep and generally allowed An Ghaeltacht have possession completely unchallenged outside their large arc. There were long, beige passages of play where An Ghaeltacht players soloed the ball standing on the spot before offloading laterally for the next player to take a standing solo.
An Ghaeltacht manager Fergal Ó Sé victory with his backroom team/ Photograph: James Lawlor/Inpho
Ruaidhrí Ó Beaglaoich was even able to fumble a solo at one stage and still gather the ball back up from the ground at his leisure. An Ghaeltacht led 0-9 to 0-1 at half-time, with Glenullin’s second score only arriving in the 51st minute – 43 minutes after their opening point.
If the spectacle itself was hard on the eye, the colourful Glenullin ultras made sure it wasn’t easy on the ear either – trumpeting vuvuzelas and air horns whenever An Ghaeltacht had the ball. And the Kerry champions had 76 per cent possession in the first half.
The constant drone clogging the air around Croke Park was very much in keeping with the pedestrian nature of events on the pitch.
Neither team managed to score for the first 18 minutes of the second half.
“I’m just heartbroken, I’m so annoyed with ourselves that we just didn’t do ourselves justice and that’s something we talked about all year, about doing ourselves justice and having no regrets and unfortunately we have so many regrets stepping out of here today,” said Glenullin manager Michael O’Kane.
“One of our mantras all year was ‘no regrets’, we’ve sort of lived with that all year, it sounds silly now coming out after putting in one of the worst performances our club has ever done.”
Ballymacelligott with the cup after winning the All-Ireland junior title. Photograph: James Lawlor/Inpho
The opening minutes of the intermediate final were watched from the mouth of the Cusack Stand tunnel by a group of satisfied Ballymacelligott players.
They had overcome a two-point interval deficit to beat Tyrone side Clogher Éire Óg 1-16 to 0-13 in the curtain raiser.
Stitched below the crest on the Ballymacelligott jersey was the message “Live For Luke” in memory of 18-year-old Luke Silles, who was injured while swimming at Fenit Pier last May and died in hospital the following week. His dad, Tony, is a team selector.
“A bit of destiny there maybe,” said manager Ian Blake. “I don’t like to keep on about it but we spoke about people that we’d lost during the year like Luke. Aidan Breen’s father passed away too, just those kind of things.”
On Saturday at Croke Park, Tipperary’s Upperchurch-Drombane beat Tooreen of Mayo, 4-20 to 2-24, after extra-time to win the All-Ireland intermediate hurling final. The junior hurling final was won by Kilbrittain of Cork, who beat Sligo’s Easkey 0-19 to 0-18.
All four trophies up for grabs over the weekend will reside in Munster for the next few months.
And there is a chance of a clean sweep for the province if both Ballygunner and Dingle can win their respective senior finals next Sunday.
Pádraig Ó Sé’s sister, Siún, is married to Dingle forward Paul Geaney. Those ties that bind, again.
“We’ve paved the way for them to go for it now,” said Pádraig. “It will make it much easier to travel up next weekend to watch them having won this anyway.”
As the An Ghaeltacht players walked up to collect the cup, An Poc Ar Buile boomed out from the PA system.
“All that’s good and different about west Kerry, there’s a bit of what would you call it, fiántas, or madness, in us that was evident in Croke Park today,” said Feargal Ó Sé with a smile.
“Be it Cormac Begley with a concertina inside in the dressingroom last weekend or singing An Poc Ar Buile on the steps of the Hogan Stand today, that’s all about what we are.”
It sure beats the vuvuzelas.