Meathness: a genetic condition; see Devine, Jody

Keith Duggan talks to a man associated with many of Meath's greatest days in football.

The very mention of Jody Devine is enough to make hardy Meath football men turn mushy and sentimental. The Ballinlough man developed the wonderful knack of contributing unforgettable scores in those epic championships games which seemed to feature Meath summer after summer.

Perhaps not the first man on Seán Boylan's team sheet - and sometimes not even the 15th - Devine nonetheless had the ability and dedication to feature on Meath panels for a full decade and he is indelibly associated with the brightest years of success in the Royal County.

Now, as selector under Eamonn Barry, there is the sense that Devine, more than most, is justified when he emphasises the old principle that on modern GAA teams, the last man on the panel is as important as the first. Keeping the guys who are not getting all that many playing minutes is one of the arts of management.

"Sure, I know enough about what not playing is like," he laughed earlier this week. "It's true, every footballer wants to be on the team. It's natural, but it's just not possible. And my attitude towards it was that I understood from the beginning that the purpose of the thing was about the Meath football team. It wasn't important what Jody Devine wanted as a player. And maybe I was wrong about that, maybe I should have been a bit more selfish in my thinking.

"And some games you might have believed that you really should have been starting. There is nothing you can do about those decisions, so if I got the chance to play, I went out and tried to contribute. And I think in the modern game, especially in the championship, a team will probably use up to 20 players over the course of any match. So there is scope there and I think we are moving away a bit from the mentality of 15 players."

The sight of Devine on the sideline through this league must remind Meath supporters of a certain vintage of the lion-hearted years when Meath were the de facto owners of Croke Park and Devine was like Boylan's lucky charm, sprung from the bench during the most chaotic minutes of Leinster championship games to restore order - Royal order.

It was Devine's stunning haul of four points in extra time of the second game of Meath's three-game series against Kildare in 1997 that helped perpetuate the idea that Boylan was part GAA man, part shaman.

In the emotional aftermath of Boylan's retirement, new manager Eamonn Barry called Devine with an invitation to join his team. Devine had been in charge of St Ultan's and the Meath Green Stars team, but was still "surprised and pleased" at the approach.

"It was still something I had to think hard about. I spoke with Emer, my wife - we have an 18-month-old baby and the time commitment is obviously a big factor. One of the reasons I wanted to do it was there was this feeling going around in the media that Meath football was on a downward curve. And I felt that there was plenty of footballers around Meath and that we could still be a force to be reckoned with.

"And we started training early with a big panel and won the O'Byrne Cup and the important thing now is to retain Division One status."

Although Devine was selected by Boylan on to the Meath panel for the 1991 season, he did not make his championship debut until 1993. At that time, the Meath dressingroom was crowded with storied men, players of accomplishment - Lyons, Harnan, Hayes, O'Malley, Stafford, Gillic: players that defined Gaelic football at the time.

Now, Nigel Crawford and Anthony Moyles are the most senior players on the county squad. Devine reckons that while the atmosphere is not as intimidating as it was, the sessions are just as intense.

"The season is different now. Going back to when you played a few league games before Christmas, it probably felt more relaxed. Now, every league game is important and you are thinking in terms of 12 weeks to championship. Like, we play Laois at the weekend, a county that has made massive strides, and these are the kind of games you need at this time of year.

"And Eamonn is working with a big panel and the effort from everyone has been really encouraging. And there is the sense that lads are playing for places."

If there has been one major change in the decade since Meath disproved Alan Hansen's soccer dictum that you never win anything with kids, it is that the sense of team has assumed even greater importance.

"It was always there in that, say, John McDermott would be able to field a ball better than me and I might be able to carry it faster than someone else. And you play to your strengths. But maybe traditionally in Gaelic football there was a tendency to give credit to the guy that sticks the ball over the bar.

"But a good point might originate in a corner back getting an interception or whatever. There has to be fairly detailed analysis of the total contribution so that you can break it down and say, okay, this is what earned us this victory or this is what we need to improve upon, or whatever."

Of course, what made Meath teams great in the past was a quality that seemed to stay just beyond the realms of analysis. It was just their Meathness, a genetic condition, a stubbornness of the soul. Boylan had it and it was reflected in his players.

Devine had it. It was a quality that meant we expected Meath to come back and win games they had no right to win. And Devine hopes that it is a trait that the present team will display over time.

"If you go back to 1986 or so, well, I think the Meath football supporters got fair value for money. The county has produced a lot of great footballers since that time. But there were always setbacks. Injuries happened. You got sucked into an epic against Kildare or Dublin that would leave you vulnerable. Winning back-to-back All-Irelands has proven to be an awfully hard task.

"Meath is like any county: we have had good years and bad. And in terms of our ambition, look, all we are thinking about is the league and our first championship game against Louth. But we feel have a good squad here and we are happy with it. So we will just have to wait and see what happens."