In the Berkeley Court hotel in Dublin yesterday, it was riddle time. The managers of the teams which face each other in Croke Park on Sunday, minus the absent Mick O'Dwyer, met the press and were prodded into pondering on who might win the Bank of Ireland Leinster championship now that Meath had been erased.

When Offaly scalped the All-Ireland champions on Sunday, they did more than just win a game. They took sledgehammers to the Berlin Wall. They wiped away clouds that sat fat and heavy across Kildare. They gave Dublin fans consent to sport their Arnotts jerseys with the swagger of old.

They infused wary Louthmen with romantic flights of fancy, with bold talk about "going all the way". In short, Offaly changed the world.

But everyone, of course, was keeping up appearances. We didn't really expect to see Tom Carr of Dublin march in with a sky blue tee-shirt proclaiming "Dublin: Leinster or bust."

We couldn't honestly have hoped to encounter Louth manager Paddy Clarke sauntering down the corridor whistling Summertime. Was there ever any danger that Kildare boss Mick O'Dwyer would cancel training for the week, maybe take his lads out on the tear?

No, on the surface, it was business as usual. "Well, I was at Croke Park on Sunday and I'd no smile on my face. I was terribly disappointed for Meath," deadpanned Carr.

"We don't necessarily feel any closer to winning and I don't think we have a right to. I'd have been very insulted on Sunday night and Monday morning if I had been an Offaly player. People didn't read Offaly now as winning a Leinster title. It was going to be Dublin or Kildare or someone else.

"But that is more of a traditional expectation than a realistic one. With Meath not in it now, people automatically assume that Dublin will step into the breach."

But surely for Paddy Clarke's Louth the flight path now looks a lot less hazardous? "Well, it will definitely give the players greater self-belief, which had been the biggest thing we suffered from in the past. But it'll also increase the pressures because people will now see the Leinster final as being a real possibility and expectations will be higher. That could cause the players to have their own doubts."

For Ger Halligan of Wexford, the taming of Meath hasn't, however, precipitated any radical change in outlook. "For us, it didn't matter that much. Our Leinster final is against Dublin on Sunday. It really is great to be playing them. We are down in Division Two B or wherever it is and we need to be playing the big teams if we are to progress," he said.

Although Meath's bowing out made for blue skies on Monday morning, it also served to underline the uncertainty of championship life. If Meath can go . . .

Hence, the managers were unanimous in their view about what their aims were this year. Asked about their feelings on the apparent waning attractiveness of Gaelic football, they made it clear that style doesn't really matter.

"Our jobs are on the line. Winning is all and entertainment comes second," said Clarke smiling.

"Every year we hear that it's the worst ever. Maybe the game is in decline for different reasons but the amount of effort and time put in has increased tenfold, even since I was playing," countered Carr.

"If we beat Dublin by a point on Sunday and it's truly the worst game you've ever seen, I'll be the happiest man in Croke Park," promised Halligan.

As the man said, winning is all. So who is going to do it? Carr was making no firm predictions: "We've been building a team for the past few years but you don't actually know what progress you've made until you take the field. You can talk about the game all you want but until the ball is thrown in for 70 minutes of football - as Offaly proved on Sunday - you can make no definitive conclusion."

Halligan was more upbeat: "Winning games does breed confidence and it is looking better for us. Hopefully, we'll see the results this Sunday," he offered.

"If we win a Leinster title, there won't be a cow milked in Louth for a week," said Paddy Clarke.

So it's all up for grabs.

Tickets for Sunday's Leinster football championship doubleheader at Croke Park will be available on Saturday at Portlaoise office (11.30 to 5.30) and New Stand ticket office (11.30 to 5.30) and on Sunday from the mobile office's at North Circular Road and Clonliffe Road (from 1.0).