The Laois generation game

Leinster SFC Final: Keith Duggan talks to Jim Sayers, a member of the last Laois team to win a Leinster championship in 1946, and the grandfather of midfielder Padraig Clancy

The 1946 Leinster final between Laois and Kildare came close to never being played.

"We wanted it postponed," remembers Jim Sayers from Laois, "because Bill Delaney had four ribs smashed. But Kildare weren't agreeable to that and we were so annoyed that we were going to give them a walkover. But Bill came in on the day and said that we would play the bloody match. Dr O'Connell strapped him up and he had a fine game as I recall."

Twenty-seven thousand people paid into Croke Park to see them defeat the favourites by a score of 0-11 to 1-6. The Laois players met on the Sunday morning and made their way to the capital in cars. Windows were draped with white sheets as they made their way across the plains of Kildare. It was still quite early in the morning and so there were few people around, just these white sheets fluttering in the breeze.

"We didn't make much noise going through there on the way up. Kildare were fancied for the game. But I do remember that on the way back down there was not a single white garment to be seen."

Sayers arrived in Laois from the Kerry Gaeltacht in order to take up a teaching post in Rathdowney. The clear Kerry lilt dances down the phone line and although he is fond of bemoaning his age, you sense it bothers him little. There were just two rings before he picked up the receiver in his home near Timahoe.

Sayers's arrival in the county was timely. A rich harvest of players yielded three Leinster titles in a row from 1936 to 1938 and although the county endured a lean period during the second World War, a nice young squad had developed by the end of the Emergency. Sayers, who played regularly with Dingle and occasionally with Kerry, was brought on to the Laois senior panel almost immediately.

"Well, we didn't train or anything like that. It just wasn't possible. There was no manager as such. We were all busy working - fishing, farming, jobs of that description. Mick O'Connell was the first man I ever saw who brought that sort of discipline to his game. He arrived for a game precisely three-quarters of an hour before the ball was thrown in and did some running and kicking and got himself ready. His dedication was much ahead of his time. Then, as soon as it was over, he was gone. He never liked any fuss. And he was right."

Arrangements were made to meet ahead of a match, players turned up and the game was played.

There was no reception the night of 1946 nor did the players expect it. "Not at all. I didn't drink anyway so it made little difference. No, we just played the game and made our way home again."

Laois had defeated Louth, Offaly and Dublin on their way to the final and knew the Kildare team by reputation. Sayers was marking a player named Bob Norton, who was pointed out to him shortly before the game.

"I knew that he had caused Wexford terrible problems by sheer trickery. He was a good man to win a ball and sometimes go down for a free. I was determined he wouldn't get away with that against me. But it was a tight game. Tommy Murphy scored eight points from both sides of the field, landing 50s and from play.

"And that was with the old heavy leather ball, remember, not the little white thing that is used now. God, he was as good as I have seen."

In the All-Ireland semi-final, they played Roscommon.

"And we were beaten anyway," concludes Sayers. "They had the Murray boys and Jack McQuillan, ah, a good team."

Sayers played on for a few years after that but Laois failed to win Leinster again. If you had told any of that 1946 team that they would be the last ones to win Leinster medals: "Oh, God, there is no way we would have believed it. We still don't."

These days, he likes to take down his own medal and show it to his grandson, Padraig Clancy, midfielder on the current team. He has teased him in recent weeks, making a big production of taking the medal out and showing it to Padraig, telling him not to worry about winning one, that he can have his 1946 medal.

"And he says back: 'No, Don't want it. I'll get me own'."

He reckons the point his grandson kicked against Dublin - a long, direct old-fashioned thing that looked good from the moment of connection - was as good as he has seen.

"When we speak I would encourage him to give it into the forwards quickly. Micko has them doing that now. Let it in and see what happens. But that was a great score he got."

He doesn't say it, but you sense that Sayers is quietly satisfied that it has taken a Kerryman to bring Laois to the point where they can contemplate bridging 57 years of moderate football summers.

"Mick's arrival has been a key factor. The big thing he has brought in is discipline. Players just toe the line under him and learned early on what he would and would not tolerate. And in return he is extremely loyal to them. The players were there but he seems to have been able to get a lot out of them very quickly."

The splendours of the new Croke Park have yet to be enjoyed first hand by Jim Sayers. Although he knows from television how impressive the stadium is and how unrecognisable it has become since the day of the 1946 final, he has some reservations about the prevailing direction of the association and the games.

The mood of seriousness, the talk of professionalism and the pressure on players is not something he is comfortable with and he is glad that he played in an era when the game was regarded as a pastime.

"And it still should be, it is an amateur game and ought to remain that way."

He is glad to admit, however, that these are the best of times. Laois is alive with the talk of football in a way that dramatically exceeds the build-up to 1946. A Leinster final has become an event, a summer show that has captured the imagination of a county and the colour, the talk and the anticipation is wonderful.

Time has made the 1946 team a valuable part of Laois folklore. Had, as Sayers would have expected, the county followed that championship up with another a few years later, the 1946 team would have been quickly forgotten.

Sayers would have preferred it that way. Instead, theirs is the picture framed in every football pub in the county. Strong, brylcreem groomed men in black and white. It does not please him, this regard for an old football match. He wants to see the circle completed.

So Jim Sayers reckons he will make his way to Croke Park tomorrow. No white sheets and no need to stay quiet. His hope is to see Padraig Clancy bring a second Leinster medal into the family.

"It's about time. There are four of us left from '46. If Laois win, then they can bury us."