No one has brought more paralysis to the analysis of this All-Ireland final than Stephen Cluxton. What else can be said about the Dublin goalkeeper’s kick-outs that hasn’t been already been said?
“Well, there wasn’t much of a strategy to it, before,” says Denis Bastick. “You beat your man to the ball, or you didn’t.”
At least Bastick is speaking from considerable experience, from within the ring itself: from midfield to minefield, Bastick has found himself central to the evolution, and whether or not he starts in Sunday’s final showdown against Kerry, he will at some stage be in the thick of it.
Between himself, Brian Fenton, and Michael Darragh Macauley, there is now an innate understanding with Cluxton, because there has to be. Bastick was one of the few Dublin footballers presented to the media before Sunday’s final, and it wasn’t long until the subject of Cluxton came up.
“Certainly, being involved in a team that has Stephen Cluxton, I have come through the transition of his kick-outs over the years,” he says. “When I started off, we had Ciarán Whelan in the middle of the field and the tactics evolved with him and Shane Ryan and later on Michael Darragh Macauley.
“There have been lots of changes over the last few years. If you look at it, the one guarantee in a game is that you are going to have 40 kick-outs. That’s 40 potential possessions. Of course it’s going to be a dominant area that you put a lot of focus on.
“Initially, when I started off first, it was a matter of putting the ball down and kicking it out as far as possible. You had the likes of Dermot Earley, Ciarán Whelan, Darragh Ó Sé and these guys who were built to go out there and catch the ball. Slowly it started changing, to what it is now. You see the two goalkeepers rushing to the ball, rushing to the tee, trying to get it out in a few seconds. That happens over time, and as a player, you have to grow with it.
“Now, every match you play, even for the club, people are trying different kick-outs. It has kind of happened naturally until it has got to where we are now. It’s been a natural process. But if you look at it, from start to finish, there’s a huge difference.”
There is, says Bastick, an extra physicality to the shorter, quicker and more targeted kick-outs - especially when they’re coming from both ends: “For both keepers to be doing it it’s going to take its toll. It depends on the score line, what each team is doing. Us, personally, we’re trying to condition ourselves to be able to withstand that, but it’s only natural that it’ll wane off over a period of time. You’d like to think you’d be able to go for a full 35 or 37 minutes and then take your break at that stage. To keep a high tempo up until the half-time stage and then reassess and go again.
“But there’s no switching off. Your body is probably well able for the quick kick-outs, but mentally you just need to be sharp and on top of your game. What’s happening is you switch off for a second or you made a long run or a sprint and all of a sudden your man gets a quick kick out. It’s a concentration thing.
“And what Kerry have done to date, I think, is to kick-out long and back their midfielders. So that brings its own challenges, in terms of breaking ball and winning primary possession. We’ll have to be ready for it too if they do push up on us.”
Bastick was first brought into the Dublin panel in 2006, and while he didn’t nail down a starting place until 2009 - and originally at full-back - he’s been ever present in the Dublin midfield since. At 34, he’s now the oldest panel member, and so also speaks from considerable experience when recounting Dublin’s last two championship meetings with Kerry: the 2011 All-Ireland final (which he started), and the 2013 semi-final (where he came off the bench).
“We’re two All-Irelands up now (2011, and 2013), while we were kind of unknown going in, in 2011. So there’s definitely a lot of experience now in the team and a lot of the younger players who have come on, they’ve experience of winning their own under-21s.
“So we’re in a different position. And they’re coming in to get the two in a row, as champions, so there’s a lot of pressure maybe on them. Whatever has gone in the past, we’re just really trying to focus on this. We’re a different team, to what was in the past, but we’re also trying to draw on those experiences.
“Maybe in recent times, in the championship, we’ve had the upper hand, but all that goes out the window, in terms of All-Ireland finals, as we’ve seen in the past.”
