Fallon's Town Talk: Well-deserved recognition for a talented sportsman

As my nephew and I sat into the car to begin our journey home from the All-Ireland football final, we turned on the radio to listen to the tail-end of RTÉ 1’s post-match coverage. The panel were picking their team of the year and the selection was meandering along in predictable fashion with players from Dublin and Kerry dominating.

Then, in a replica of one of those bewildering switches in direction that characterised his football career, Colm Cooper said Enda Smith should be in the half-forward line. The attention of the two occupants of the car heading down the M4 moved to a new level. The rest of the panel and presenter Des Cahill sounded momentarily taken aback by the Gooch’s declaration, but Paul Flynn and Eamon O’Hara readily agreed: Roscommon’s talisman was on the RTÉ 1 Team of the Year and, by extension, in the conversation for an All-Star.

Smith didn’t make the ‘Sunday Game’ Team of the Year, despite the best efforts of Lee Keegan, but the ‘Sunday Game’ selection has been a notoriously unreliable guide to the All-Stars over the years.

I thought a bigger setback to Enda’s prospects came on the BBC’s popular podcast ‘The GAA Social’ the day after the All-Ireland. Wicklow manager Oisin McConville didn’t include Smith among the contenders for his team of the year. When pressed on this, he said the All-Star selectors might include a player such as Enda Smith as a token selection. It was a comment unworthy of McConville who is one of the most knowledgeable football analysts around.

However, Enda was chosen by the highly-regarded ‘Examiner Gaelic Football Show’ podcast and ‘The Sunday Times’ on their teams while also making the top 15 in the ‘Irish Independent’s list of the best footballers this year.

Those nods were well-deserved acknowledgements but, for all the scheme's faults, the All-Stars are like the Oscars; it’s the one award that resonates with the public and which has lasting allure. As the fanfare greeted the imminent announcement of the team in the RDS last Friday night, did I expect the Boyle maestro to make the team? The honest answer is probably not. It wasn’t that Enda didn’t deserve his award, he definitely did – and not as a token selection either.

Smith has been superb right through the year; from the opening league match against Tyrone, when he came off the bench to set up two match-winning goals, to valiantly trying to stave off championship elimination against Cork, he has been immense. In between, Smith was, along with Brian Stack, one of Roscommon’s stand-out players in the national league and won three player of the match awards during the championship.

No, the reason I was reluctant to believe Smith would get his overdue national recognition is because a player from a less successful county has to be much better than the other contenders to get selected. That is the fate that befell Enda’s two immediate predecessors as Roscommon’s best-known footballer.

In 2003 Frankie Dolan kicked 0-12 and 0-13 in successive championship matches. He lit up Roscommon’s journey through the qualifiers on their way to the All-Ireland quarter-finals. Like Smith this year, Dolan was among the best 15 footballers of that year, but he didn’t get an All-Star. I was at the ceremony that night and well remember the disappointment among the Roscommon delegation.

In 2010 Donie Shine kicked 0-10 in the Connacht senior final and was the star player on the Roscommon senior and U-21 teams that won their respective Connacht titles. He was nominated for an All-Star but, incredibly, wasn’t nominated for Young Player of the Year. It took until Conor Carroll this year for a Rossie to be nominated for that prestigious award.

So, I wasn’t hopeful about Enda Smith’s prospects which made the elation all the greater when Marty Morrissey read out his name. Smith is just Roscommon’s second All-Star award recipient in the last 32 years. It is quite a change in fortunes from the first decade of the scheme when 10 awards came to the county.

The award has lifted the mood of the county’s sporting fraternity. The pride and jubilation was reflected in the crowd that turned out in Abbey Park in Boyle to greet a footballer who has also been hugely popular, but this year joined the pantheon of the great Roscommon footballers of the last 50 years. Enda, his family and the Boyle club are well entitled to enjoy the celebrations.