For Kerry legend Kieran Donaghy, the 2001 All-Ireland minor football semi-final was not a game he was expecting to appear in.
In his youth, Donaghy focused more on basketball than GAA - a decision that has paid off since his retirement from intercounty football - and had not expected to be in contention for the Kerry minor panel for the 2001 season.
The Austin Stacks man made the choice to hit the town the week before Kerry's semi-final with Dublin, as the Rose of Tralee was taking place in his home town - when a call came from minor manager Mikey Sheehy that changed the course of his career.
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Kieran Donaghy remembers hilarious call-up for 2001 minor semi-final
The 2001 Kerry minor football team was something of a "who's who" of players who would go on to define an era of terrific success for the county.
In goals was Bryan Sheehan, who would later star as a midfielder in five All-Ireland triumphs at senior level, while Donnacha Walsh and Declan O'Sullivan were also among those to go on to great success with the senior team.
2 September 2001; Colm Cooper of Kerry in action against Graham Dent of Dublin during the All-Ireland Minor Football Championship Semi-Final match between Dublin and Kerry at Croke Park in Dublin. Photo by Damien Eagers/Sportsfile
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The headline name was the corner forward - who else but Colm Cooper - and a late addition to the panel for the Dublin semi-final was one Kieran Donaghy of Austin Stacks.
Donaghy appeared on this week's GAA Minor Moments podcast with Electric Ireland, and remembered the call-up for his first appearance with the county minors.
The Kerry legend was certainly thrown in at the deep end, and remembers scrambling for a pair of boots that would fit him and serve him well on the Croke Park turf:
I had decided to go out and then my mam rang up with the portable phone from the house and said, 'the great Mikey Sheehy's on the phone - you were very good on Monday night and we want to bring you in for the All-Ireland semi-final on Sunday against Dublin.'
It was pretty dramatic, all of a sudden you're up there, you're in Croke Park.
I remember getting the news on a Thursday and, of course, my boots at the time wouldn't have been of the highest spec. Hard when you're size 13 and you don't have a lot of money at that stage, so I remember roping mam into bringing me down to buy me a new pair of boots. Unfortunately, all you could get at the time was a size 12, when I'm a size 13. The new Preds were out at the time and I was excited to have them on!
I remember getting the call [as a sub] after about 12 minutes...I wasn't expecting to come in that early but Dublin were rampagin away with the game at the time by a point or two, I think. All of a sudden it was 'get in there fast.' At half-time I had to take off the Preds and go back to the rather shabby World Cups I had at the time, which were about a year-and-a-half old. It's hard to be comfortable in size 13 in Ireland!
Donaghy was asked whether he had felt nerves at being flung into the spotlight for such a major occasion - but said that the big day in Croke Park did not faze him.
In fact, he said it was the lofty expectations planted on him when he returned home to Austin Stacks weeks later that affected him most.
To be honest, I remember saying this afterwards - I played a club game with the Stacks two weeks later. I remember coming on in that and I was far more nervous coming on in that, because I played in Croke Park two weeks previous and I probably all of a sudden felt that there was a bit of expectation on me.
At that stage in my career, I was trying to prove everyone wrong, prove that I was good enough.
I remember not being nervous at all that day [in Croke Park].
Though Kerry would lose to Dublin that day in Croke Park, Donaghy was indeed to prove that he was good enough to mix it at the highest level.
When the Kingdom won the senior All-Ireland in 2006, Donaghy, Cooper, O'Sullivan, and Sheehan would all feature, with Donaghy scoring 1-2 and winning footballer of the year.
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