Having watched the win over Wales a year ago in the Confession Box, a pub around the corner from his then Sean McDermott Street home, Graham Burke admits he still struggles at times to take in how much his life has changed in 12 months.
The 24 year-old was at both legs of the play-off against Denmark as a supporter and admits that if you had told them then that he would make his own international debut against France a few months later then score for Ireland in Lansdowne Road he would not have believed it.
“But it all came so fast that there was no real time to think about it,” he says. “This is happening: Boom! You know what I mean?
“I got off the boat when I was coming [into Dublin this week] and I could see the Aviva. I was looking at it and thinking, ‘I was playing there for my country and I scored’. I came home by boat because I had to bring my missus and my dog home. I was coming back, looked at the Aviva and thought about it. Growing up on Sean McDermott Street, to think that would have happened . . .
Content now
“You could have told me after that game that I’d have to stop playing football and I would have said, ‘Yeah, fair enough, I’m content now, that’ll be fine for me,” but, he admits: “once you get a taste of it, you just want to keep doing it.
“I was quite happy before at Rovers and happy with life here, being around everybody,” says the Dubliner.
“I was looking to buy a house in Ireland just before I left [for Preston]. I was bidding on a house and then all this came and: Boom! See you later everybody. It’s brilliant. I wouldn’t change it for anything.”
