Chrissy McKaigue was sitting eating his breakfast, still stewing over Slaughtneil’s county final defeat, when his phone started to hop this morning.
As a nominee, plans were already afoot to attend Friday's PwC All Star banquet in Dublin but McKaigue just assumed that the winners were being revealed on the night and thought no more about it as he processed his disappointment from last Sunday.
Instead, the alerts on his phone brought the pleasant surprise that he and Conor Glass, a member of the Glen team that vanquished Slaughtneil, were indeed Derry’s first All Stars in 15 years.
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“I could ramble out the old cliche about nothing trumps the collective award in comparison to the individual and obviously that does hold merit but, the reality is, it’s a hugely prestigious award and one that I’m very respectful of and very honoured to have received,” says McKaigue.
“It would be quite remiss of me if I didn’t give huge credit to Rory Gallagher because the way our games are structured, if you’re not one of the best teams in the country in any given year you don’t get these type of accolades.
“He has been the main driver of creating the environment for Derry, for bringing them back from the brink to being a top four side in the country.
“All them things would be on my mind and I think it’s important to display a type of gratitude to the others that have allowed me to get to this point.”
Glass is eight years McKaigue’s junior and hasn’t endured the hardship of dropping all the way to Division Four and numerous swift exits from the Ulster Championship, and so probably has a different perspective on the success that they have enjoyed together this year.
Indeed, at 33, McKaigue is among the oldest first-time recipients of an All Star award.
“I’ve always took a huge amount of prestige from playing for my county but also playing against the best teams and the best players and yes, you can’t always win and more often than not Derry got beaten in them games but I would have always been happy in some regard to be playing at that level because that’s what I ultimately wanted to be as a child growing up.
“But I suppose now that I’ve got to a stage where Derry are back at the top table, and hopefully will remain there for a long time, I suppose it’s sort of reinvented me, certainly mentally.
“There’s been a bit of commentary around the age of receiving an All Star and receiving my first All Star but it’s probably not a stat or a fact that I want shouted too loud because 33 is a fair age in the inter-county game and you probably are more aware now that I certainly am closer to the end than I am to the start.”
The deeper he goes into his 30s, marking some of the game’s marquee forwards becomes more of a high-wire act. In this year’s Championship, McKaigue was tasked with shackling Darren McCurry, Jack McCarron, Paddy McBrearty, Keelan Sexton and Rob Finnerty and was rarely flustered.
“I wouldn’t go as far as saying I enjoy it. It’s a scary, scary enough thing when you’re going out to mark the marquee forwards at inter-county level week in, week out but I think there’s great satisfaction and there’s an undeniable responsibility with it because you know if you can at least break even you’re going to give your team a better chance of winning the game.
“So with that responsibility does come pressure but with pressure and responsibility, if things go right, does come a huge amount of satisfaction.
“The fact that I’m still able to do it at my age shows I’m doing something right but very aware that each day you go out you have to prove it because you’re only bad experience away from a marquee forward giving you a day that you won’t forget too handy.”
The phone continued to buzz right throughout the day.
“The amount of well wishes and nice messages and calls that I’ve got has been unbelievable.
“Your family are always a wee bit more maybe less complimentary but I suppose proud in their own right.
“I can safely say the wider GAA family too, along with close family, have been very complimentary and very supportive of it and I suppose they know me very well also and they know how much I care about it and how much I think about it.
“In many ways GAA is my obsession in life so, look, it’s been a very nice award to get and maybe a wee bit of reflection of the service that I’ve given to the game because I’ve given a fair bit.”
At 33, McKaigue is among the oldest first-time All Star winners.
Incidentally, of the six players including McKaigue that have won their first All Star at 33 or more, four of them are defenders, another was a goalkeeper and the other a midfielder, with no forward managing to break in for the first time once reaching that particular age yet.
Mick O’Connell, Kerry (1972)
O’Connell was 35 when winning his first All Star 50 years ago and is the oldest first-time recipient though it is something of a red herring as it was only the second year of the awards scheme.
Previously, he had won two Cu Chulainn awards, a precursor to the All Star scheme which ran from 1963-67, in 1964 and ‘65.
Paddy McCormack, Offaly (1972)
‘The Iron Man’ was 33 when he won his first award at full-back the same year as O’Connell was chosen at midfield, at the end of a long and storied career with Offaly which yielded six Leinster titles and two All Stars
Similar to O’Connell, the unflinching defender may well have won one sooner had the All Stars been in existence throughout his senior inter-county career which started in 1957 and petered out after he suffered a serious eye injury in 1972.
Tom Heneghan, Roscommon (1979)
The Castlerea St Kevin’s man was 33 when he won his only award in 1979 at left corner-back during what remains Roscommon’s best era since their All-Ireland wins of the 1940s as they won four successive Connacht titles, a League title in ‘79 and reached the 1980 All-Ireland final.
Heneghan managed Roscommon to the 1978 All-Ireland under-21 title and was in charge of the senior team in the final defeat to Kerry in 1980 having stepped back from playing after winning his All Star.
Dermot Deasy, Dublin (1993)
The versatile Deasy played intermittently for Dublin from the early ‘80s before becoming more of a regular in the ‘90s as they finally shook off Meath in Leinster only to repeatedly fall short to Ulster opposition in the All-Ireland series.
Deasy claimed his only All Star at full-back in 1993 having turned 33 and he finally won that elusive All-Ireland two years later albeit he was injured for the final win over Tyrone.
Raymond Galligan, Cavan (2020)
A relatively late convert to the goalkeeping position having first played for Cavan out the field, Galligan was a revelation as they won their first Ulster title in 23 years in 2020, kicking long range frees and 45s as well as making a string of saves across the campaign.
He was 33 when one of three Cavan All Stars that year, bringing the county’s total to five.
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