Now it's O Se's turn to prevail

PASSION. Commitment. Enthusiasm. To anyone even vaguely aware of Paidi O Se's life in football, it will come as no surprise that the above qualities are those most frequently mentioned in relation to the Kerry manager. Fine qualities they are too but, in the week leading up to tomorrow's Bank of Ireland Munster football final, they begin to catch up with him.

No longer able to channel his intensity into playing, O Se will have realised that he will be judged by what his players do on the pitch and all he will be able to do is watch. Last Monday, with the game beginning to loom into sight, Paidi was giving the impression of being a bit edgy.

Hugely hospitable and polite - but edgy. He weighed his words carefully and there was little of the abrasively entertaining opinion that marked his conversation before he became accountable for the county team.

Outside his pub in Ventry and across the road from his shop, visitors hover. The tourist season is beginning in earnest. So, too, the football season and with a fair stake in both, there's no doubt which he's feeling more keenly. Tomorrow will be O Se's first Munster final as manager. It comes amidst and times for Kerry football. Since the county last won an All Ireland in 1986 with O'Se as corner back, there has been only one Munster title and two defeats of Cork, although the county have played every year.

Adding to the pressure, one presumes, is the fact that some of the setbacks in recent years drew withering, public criticism from O Se. Now it's his turn. Wouldn't you be a bit edgy?

There's no need to recap that much on the career of Paid O Se. One of only three players along with Pat Spillane and predecessor as Kerry manager, Ogie Moran - to figure on all eight of Mick O'Dwyer's All Ireland winning teams, his was a ferocious presence at right wing back and later, right corner back.

His background, in the west Kerry gaeltacht, had its share of football. Although his father wasn't a notable player, 1958 All Ireland medallist Tom Long was a cousin and brother Tom won a minor All Ireland in 1963 and another brother Mike played junior for Kerry.

Mick O'Connell was his footballing hero as he grew up and even now, merits an unshared mention when O Se is asked about the best players he remembers. His career even overlapped with the Valentia islander's in the early 1970s. By then O Se's career was on the move with a clutch of under 21 All Ireland successes.

His colleagues generally have difficulty remembering him having a bad match when the stakes were high. "He was always good for the big day," according to John O'Keeffe who shared defensive duties with him in five successful All Ireland finals. "He psyched himself up and was reliable to produce it on those days.

Micky O'Sullivan was O'Dwyer's, immediate successor and also both a captain and a member of the Kerry side in the mid 1970s. He remembers O Se in much the same way. "Nothing got in the way. He was totally on top of his game and worked very hard to achieve what he did. He was a hard draw for any forward."

Another attribute unanimously given is that he trained like a demon. One panel member recalls having a toe broken by the vigour of one challenge on the training ground. Wintering easy and, training obsessively once spring arrived Se brought the same implacability to practice as he did to the match.

"He was and is a great motivator but he was a tremendous man to train," according to Mick O'Dwyer. "He trained hard all his career, says O'Keeffe. "He needed to train hard and I'd say it possibly took its toll."

The "toll" was paid in a surprisingly abrupt end to his playing career. He began to slide off the team in 1988. Intimations of the end hadn't been far from his thoughts: "One thing used go through my mind. Is this going to be the day a fella gets 2-6 off me, takes me on a tour of Croke Park? It helped me keep that extra bit ahead of the posse."

This probably ensured that when the day came, it wasn't in Croke Park. The end came easily. "I didn't find it a bit difficult," he says. "In 88 I was dropped for the Munster final but I trained the winter and was playing great at the start of 89. I was brought back in and would have gained my place but I got injured in a club game and it knocked me out of gear. I came into training one night and made the decision.

"I could feel in there that Kerry weren't going to win any more - and that my race was run as well. Dwyer's record speaks for itself but when I was first left out, I was thinking 25 reasons why I shouldn't be. But as Brian Lenihan said on mature reflection (sic) things weren't going well in training."

The surprise was that he could walk away from it club as well as county - according to Mickey O'Sullivan. "That isn't the way it happens normally. Players go on to the bitter end - and it is bitter. It's difficult to come to terms with the lesser profile after being very dependent on a role as a footballer. They're heroes when young and know no other life. It would have been hard for Paidi to have to be showed great discipline."

O Se picks the highlights of his career without difficulty: The first All Ireland in 1975 when a young, unfancied team deposed holders Dublin; 1978 when they overcame an early deficit to overwhelm Dublin and finally, 1985, when he captained Kerry to the All Ireland, again at Dublin's expense.

He preferred playing wing back although his career ended in the corner and at times encompassed midfield. "It (right wing back back) was a great position. You were involved in play a lot, challenging for breaks on both kick outs. I used to go forward a bit even though O'Dwyer never wanted me to - it was all right for Ger Power (on the other wing) but I was meant to stay back."

The move to management was something he had long anticipated. Mickey O'Sullivan remembers being on a team holiday during the 1970s. "I discussed it with him in the Canaries and he was adamant that this was the road he was going."

Involved with his divisional side, West Kerry, in coaching them to county titles in 1984 and 90, his mind was set on the Kerry job from the time he retired. Passed over twice, in favour of Mickey O'Sullivan in 1989 and Ogie Moran in 92, it is said in the county that O Se's frantic ambition to get the job prompted the occasional forceful criticisms of the county team.

"He said a few, things," according to county chairman Sean Kelly, that possibly reflected his disappointment at not getting the job and at Kerry being beaten and even the type of football being played."

Persuaded to take on the under 21s (a position gained only after a re balloted contest with Sean Walsh), he began to go places in management. Beaten in the 1993 All Ireland final by Meath, O'Se's under 21s went on to take the title after a replay against Mayo last year. Ogie Moran's tenure was up and the stage was set.

"He has very valuable assets as a manager," says Kelly. "Firstly, he has a passion about the GAA in general and he's very good to get the best out of players. He has tremendous presence."

When O Se was made manager, one of his under 21 selectors Seamus Mac Gearailt was named as coach, a sort of dual appointment. Although a long time resident of Tralee, Mac Gearailt is from the Gaeltacht club originally and his inter county career briefly overlapped O Se's. If the manager is fire, the coach is ice. A shrewd tactician, he is seen as a calming influence.

"In many ways, they are opposites," says Kelly, "but they complement one another. I think the job is too big for one person anyway training, coaching, liaising with the media - and they take the pressure off each other."

In Ventry last Monday, the manager said that he had set out "to give confidence back to the team." To that end there was no real training before Christmas. "Maybe players get too much football," he says. They need to feel fresh and hungry and that was my primary priority.

Fresh and hungry or not, the young Kerry team will be sent out from the dressing room on to one - with Croke Park - of their manager's two favourite pitches. "It is a tribute to Cork that I used to get a great sense of challenge, a mighty challenge in Pairc Ui Chaoimh."

Through the haze of whipped up emotions, a proud tradition goes on the line tomorrow as Paidi O Se again gets the sense of challenge. And Cork will be aware of his track record in meeting it.