Former Ireland, Chelsea and Crystal Palace defender - and part trainer of an inter-county GAA team - Paddy Mulligan gave a cracking interview on Newstalk's Team 33 tonight, dripping with great tales from the game in the 70s.
Back in the early 1970s, Eamon Dunphy enjoyed a reputation as a socially conscious footballer. He wore a black armband the week after Bloody Sunday, involved himself in union agitation with the PFA, and, in 1973, argued vigorously that Ireland should not tour Chile.
Their lefty-ish government - not allowed a wet week in situ by anxious corporations - had been deposed by the Chilean military with the assistance of that year's Nobel Prize winner for peace, Henry Kissinger.
(Satirical songwriter Tom Lehrer retired the day Kissinger was given the prize on the grounds that 'satire is dead' and hasn't performed since).
John Giles had just assumed the Ireland job in slightly more peaceful circumstances and a tour of Chile had already been organsised.
Dunphy was outraged by the prospect that Ireland would travel to Chile, not least because he was omitted from the squad.
Mulligan remembered Dunphy, armed with a bundle of leaflets attesting to the evils of Pinochet, gate-crashing Ireland's final training session in South London a few days before they flew out.
Eamon Dunphy wasn't in the squad. When a manager was appointed for the Irish team, Eamon Dunphy was never picked. It was only 'the committee' - who knew nothing about the game - who picked him.
So, John Giles hadn't picked him for the squad. But he came down to the Crystal Palace athletics ground, where we (Ireland) were training a few days before we headed off. He was handing out leaflets about why we shouldn't go to Chile, because of the Pinochet situation.
And I said to Eamon, 'I'm going for footballing reasons, solely and purely. The poor people of Chile - as you call them - need a break and they need to get into a stadium and get some entertainment. I'm going because I'm a professional footballer and I know exactly what's going on in Chile, because you follow it on the news, of course, but I'm not changing my stance on this.
Cue an injury to an Ireland player.
Ironically, it was Dunphy's activism in opposition to the Chilean tour that caused him to be selected for the Chilean tour.
According to Mulligan, he was invited on tour simply because he happened to be in the vicinity.
As it happens, I can't recall who got injured, but sombody got injured and because he was there at Crystal Palace and it was handy he was brought on the trip.
So, he was called up to the squad. So it's all bluff and bluster. As it has been, because I know Eamon since he was 12 years of age, and he's always been like that.
I just said to him, 'you're coming now, so much for your beliefs.'
Elsewhere on the show, Mulligan also told the little-known story about how he trained the Dublin-based Galway footballers during the 1987 and 1988 seasons (Brian Talty, Barry Brennan, Gay McManus, et al).
Though born in Dublin, Mulligan is an ardent Galway GAA fan. The team won the Connacht title in '87, beating Mayo in Castlebar before being denied a famous Croker victory over Cork in the semi-final with a late Larry Tompkins equaliser. They were hammered in the replay.
Interestingly, Micheal O'Mhuirceartaigh fulfilled the same role for the Kerry footballers during the golden era.
