“This year it’s been kind of a different journey for me, but I’m just relieved just the way it ended, the way we got over the line," is Bernard Brogan’s assessment regarding another silverware laden campaign in a Dublin jersey.

A fourth All Ireland win in six years confirmed Dublin's brilliance, while Bernard Brogan was also happy to secure family bragging rights too.

“I had a good bit of craic with me da and my brother, they have three All-Irelands and obviously I’ve pushed into the fourth so there was a bit of slagging over that,” Brogan joked.

“But it’s a very special Dublin team, the players and the lads who came through the ranks, lads like Brian Fenton and (Ciaran) Kilkenny, these young lads just came into the team and have just been in unbelievable form from day one.

“So the future is still bright."

That is what Brogan is so encouraged about - how a new crop of players have emerged to assist established forces such as himself, Paul Flynn, Michael Darragh MacAuley, who weren't included in the 2016 GAA/GPA Opel All Star nominations.

“Yeah, we need that because I have been lucky enough to have four All Stars, Flynner is the same, he has four, Michael Darragh has a couple, and a Player of the Year as well," Brogan admits.

“To see the nominations without us, it’s a sign of the character of that team, the sign of a true panel and of players coming from all over the park and off the bench, and all adding to it.

“It’s a sign of the panel that Jim (Gavin) has built. He’ll play lads that are playing well and for a young lad coming through to think, 'If I play well I have a chance of playing'.

“Cormac Costello hadn’t played all year and he was hurting, he really went after it in training the last couple of weeks and he was flying, and Jim gave him his rewards for that."

Brogan acknowledges that it was a demanding stint between the drawn and replayed clashes against Mayo. “It was tough. The week would have probably been grand. Two weeks was a long period of time. When you build yourself up for a big game – and I know we didn’t perform that well – even if we had won, we would have been thinking ‘we would have liked to do that better.’

“Two weeks was long. In fairness to Jim, he didn’t slog us. He didn’t do hour-long meetings. He kept things short and sharp. He let lads get their head space right.

“The workload had been done. It’s just about getting our mind right and learning from the mistakes we made from the first day and just letting lads express themselves.”

Brogan is respectful about how Gavin informed him about the decision that he wouldn't start the replay. "As I said I have played a lot and Jim would always show players respect and talk to them on their own, so Jim took me aside and just said ‘this is the way we think is the route for the game’, and I just said ‘no, problem, whenever you need me I’m ready to come in and do a job," Brogan revealed.

"There’s no point in moping about around it, it was about putting the mindset right and getting a performance.

"Jim said to me ‘you’re not going to start the next day, but we are going to need you at some stage’. I was like ‘grand,’ obviously disappointed, but I was like ‘okay, no pressure on me now’.

"Jim said when I came on I was going to finish so when it happened just go at it like and I took a lot of energy form that.

"Sometimes when you are a forward and there is a lot of competition and you miss a few chances, you are going ‘I’m going to be taken off here,’ whereas I said when I came on, I’m going to finish it out and throw everything at the game so it was a different challenge, but I actually enjoyed it."