PAUDI O'MAHONY And His Contribution To Kerry's Golden Years In 1975 Kerry goalkeeper Paudi O'Mahony won his first All-Ireland Senior medal, maintaining a clear sheet throughout the Championship campaign. It was one his finest achievements in his days with the so called Kerry "Dream Team" of that era. "We played Cork in the Munster final in '75' and I saved a penalty from Jimmy Barry Murphy which I was very happy with. Jimmy was the best forward I ever played against. He was always very tricky and you couldn't let your concentration lapse for a minute when he was around. In the All-Ireland semi-final against Sligo I also saved a penalty from Mickey Kearins so it was certainly a year to remember for me." Long standing GAA followers will remember Paudi O'Mahony for a number of reasons, not least of which was his two fine saves from JBM and Kearins. He will also be recalled for his early departure from one All-Ireland final. In the 1976 decider against Dublin he was off after receiving a bad Achilles tendon injury, but was introduced as a sub during 1978 when Charlie Nelligan was sent off. O'Mahony played in many of the biggest games of the seventies, games which have since gone into the folklore including the 1977 'classic' between Kerry and Dublin. This is regarded by many as the best exhibition of gaelic football in modern times. Regarded by many that is, except Paudi O'Mahony himself who feels the Munster final replay against Cork the same year had all the ingredients of a real classic. "I think the match against Cork was better than the Dublin game. It had all the thrills and spills. The first game was good but the replay was brilliant, a real epic. It was a 70 minute match and there was fifty thousand people packed into Pairc Ui Chaoimh. The ground had just been opened at that stage. They had let something like sixty thousand into the drawn game. They weren't sure what the capacity was at the time but the replays was something special," he recalls. A goalkeeper for his county Paudi played all his club football from Spa, based in Killarney usually filling an outfield position. Brought up just outside the town, Paudi was educated in St Brendan's, helping the college to an All-Ireland title in 1969, lining out alongside John and Ger O'Keefe and Paudi Lynch. A year later O'Mahony was on the Kerry Minor team which reached the All-Ireland final. It was his first trip as a player to Croke Park but it ended in disappointment as opponents Galway ran out winners. Success, however was achieved when the Kingdom claimed the All-Ireland Under 21 title in 1973. This was a big step forward in Paudi's progress up the footballing ladder. A few weeks after that game the young Killarney player received the call uo to the Senior panel. He heard the news of his selection in very unusual circumstances. "I had gone to the United States with Spa for a few weeks and the day we returned I remember stepping off the plane and one of the lads bought the Evening Press and I was picked on the panel for a National League game against Roscommon. I was after having three rough weeks in the US, which was hardly ideal preparation for your inter-county debut. Lucky enough, I didn't have much to do against Roscommon," he recalls. Playing outfield for his club one week Paudi would find himself back in goals for Kerry the next. It was a change of roles he was able to make with relative ease. O'Mahony had first played as a goalkeeper during hid national school days, learning the skills that were later to prove very useful. "It was while in national school I came under the influence of Tady O'Sullivan, who was the school master and had palyed for Meath, Wicklow and Kerry in his day. He was Chairman of Spa right throughout my career and he was a major influence on me." One of the skills the eager young student learned from the master was the art of kicking out a ball, an art he perfected, giving him a head-start on many of his contemporaries. "Tady O'Sullivan trained me to kick a ball properly. I always had a long kick out and it was probably the main reason why I was chosen to play in goals for Kerry. I was able to pick out players like Seanie Walsh and Jack O'Shea with a clearance. I think I was the first goalkeeper in Ireland to continually kick out the ball instead of getting the full-back do it which was the norm at the time," he adds. In his youth Paudi had carefully watched the moves of well known Kerry goalkeeper Johnny Culloty. "Johnny had retired in 1971 but there wasn't anyone coming along to replace him. Eamonn Fitzgerald had played in goals for a while but he was he was more an outfield player they tried to turn into a goalkeeper. There was a vacancy there and I was glad to get the opportunity to fill it," recalls Paudi who cites his mother Hannah and his father Gerry as two of the biggest influences on his career. Paudi considers the 1973 Under 21 All-Ireland success as the beginning of the "Dream Team" era. Few outside the county would have known it at the time. By 1975 however, it was clear to everybody that Kerry had a young team of rare quality. "Once we reached the All-Ireland final in '75 we knew we could win it. It was a new Kerry team and Dublin were expected to win by about ten points. All the pressure was on them and you could see it in their faces. They were under a lot of strain. Unfortunately the situation was completely reversed the following year. Then it was us who were feeling the pressure and it showed in our performance." In all O'Mahony won five All-Ireland medals, most of them as a squad member, from 1975 to '81. He believes the Kerry team of that era had all the qualities of greatness. "That team was disciplined, hard working, had tremendous talent and blended together as a family unit. Mick O'Dwyer was the manager and he helped to create that family atmosphere but that team was capable of looking after itself. All the players were so committed and dedicated," he says. Married to Cathryn with their three children Roisin, Diarmuid and Fiona, Paudi O'Mahony runs a consulting engineering business employing five people. Much of his spare time is spent coaching under age teams at Spa and in the past he has taken charge of the Spa-Legion combination which represents Killarney in the Senior football Championship. Having done that, been there, Paudi knows what is required to survive as a goalkeeper at the highest level. "A goalkeeper needs to be a little eccentric. It is a lonely position and you have to discipline your full-back line and control them, make sure they are looking after their markers." In every career a little rain must fall and like any top goalkeeper Paudi was not immune to the embarrassing gaff he would rather forget. "In 1976 we played Cork in the Munster final and I came to take a kick out but my studs got stuck in the ground. The ball ended up in the arms of Jimmy Barry Murphy about twenty yards away and he easily scored a goal. At that point I wanted to be taken off but we went on to win the game after extra time, thankfully." Any regrets? "It would have been nice if Kerry had achieved the five in a row in '82. Bad decisions cost us the match. Mickey Sheedy was instructed to take our penalty but he didn't want to take it. He was never a good penalty taker and he missed. It wasn't his fault but it cost us the game." Like everybody connected with Kerry football, O'Mahony is disappointed with the performance of the county team over the past eight years or so and would dearly love to see the Kingdom add to their tally of thirty All-Ireland titles. Realism however, has taken the edge off his optimism and he knows a lot more needs to be done before a Kerry goalkeeper can hope to progress through a Championship without conceding a goal, saving two penalties on the way. It is a record reserved only for the best. Taken from Hogan Stand magazine 17th February, 1995 Tweet

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