Brady hails end of long wait

To that old list of the greatest half-time moments in Croke Park we must add the tale of Ballina Stephenites.

Look at that medal, they were told. Wait for the sign. Listen to that last cry from the player who has already lost more All-Ireland finals than any one man deserved.

Half an hour later Ballina had added their name to the finest role of honour in club football. Six years late, some might say, but all the more memorable because of the delay. And all the more cherished for David Brady, the man left holding the ball on the final whistle and whose enduring drive for success for both club and county had finally reached its glorious destination.

"I've been waiting 10 years and two days for that," he said, his voice hoarse and his eyes still red with tears. "You'll never talk to a happier man who's just won an All-Ireland medal. I don't care if it's senior, junior, under-21 or ladies. I'm the happiest. I've just got the one medal now, but I'll never be afraid to show it."

Before yesterday Brady had lost six All-Ireland finals between club and county and including replays. He wasn't going to lose another one, no matter what: "If you're meant to do something then you're meant to do it. No one was going to stop us.

"And I just knew in my heart and soul we were going to win this game. I had a feeling last night like I've never had in any other team meeting. I'd been in seven or eight of them before and I never felt like I did last night. If I owned my house I would have sold it last night and put the money on winning this."

This, he said, was like no other Mayo team.

"The thing is most of these players have only lost one game in their whole life. I'm 30 and I'm the only one who knows what it's like to lose. And I don't give a shite if I never win again."

And it was a game that in the dressingroom at half-time Ballina had clearly decided they were indeed going to win - no matter what. Former Galway manager John O'Mahony had come on board in an advisory role, and told them to look for the sign. Their own manager Tommy Lyons produced an All-Ireland medal and told them to go out and win their own.

"When Portlaoise got that second goal I knew that was the moment we were going to win. John O'Mahony had told us to look for the sign. And that goal was the sign. Portlaoise didn't have a chance after that. We weren't going to be beaten."

What about his speech at half-time? "Well, you'd have to be maybe 20 years younger and playing for Ballina to have heard that." So they played the second half like they said they would. For the winning manager the old trick of producing a winner's medal had clearly worked.

"I'm not going to say whose club medal it was," explained Lyons. "But it was a real All-Ireland medal, I can guarantee you that. I just told them that's what they were playing for and they'd half an hour to achieve it. But we can give that medal back now to the man that loaned it to us. We have our own ones now."

Lyons then diverted his attention to Brady: "David is a Ballina man through and through, and he cried at half-time with determination. And if there was one man I wanted to see win an All-Ireland it was David Brady. And this was always the one he would cherish the most."

Tactically Ballina also got everything right in the second half. "Yeah, we told them to let the ball in, and play more direct," added Lyons. "But it was a very difficult game on the ticker. We were at the stage then when we were just a point up, and we brought in Aidan Tighe. And as the saying goes if I was in the trenches that's the kind of guy I would like to have behind me.

"We also have a number of basketball players on the team, and they came in very handy in the end there. They tipped it around and wound down the clock, and it was nice to be in a position like that."

Liam Brady, whose late free capped the victory, shed further light on the moment: "Hopefully that's the end of the hoodoo, if that's what you want to call it. And hopefully all of Mayo can grasp this. And who knows, Sam could be coming home next.

"It's great enough to win it yourself. But to have two brothers with you as well makes it much more special. And the one man I'm happiest for out there is the brother David. If there is one man in the whole country who deserves an All-Ireland medal then it's him."