By John Harrington

It’s fair to say that Kerry football legend, Mikey Sheehy, didn’t lack for success during his stellar career.

Eight All-Ireland medals, 11 Munster medals, three National Football League medals, and seven All-Star awards is a pretty tidy haul by any standards.

One of the most skilful forwards of his or any other generation, he wouldn’t have achieved all he did if his natural ability wasn’t complemented by a winner’s mentality.

You’re reminded of that when you ask him to cast his mind back to the first All-Star he ever won in 1976, and his immediate response is that it was the year Kerry were beaten by Dublin in the All-Ireland Final.

Once that pebble of a memory is removed from his shoe, warmer recollections of what the All-Star scheme meant to him in his playing days are easily bidden.

“My memories of the All-Stars are of all the great trips we had,” says Sheehy. “Particularly the opportunity to socialise with the lads you would have played against and would be your rivals. I think the friendships that you make out of the trips, they were special times.

“The same at the function. In our time there was a function on the Monday for the two teams to play in the All-Ireland Final. But you don't really meet that many because if you win you're relegated and if you're beaten you're bottom of the cage and you're really not in the mood to be talking to anybody.

“The function when you receive your award is always a great night. You meet guys and after a couple of jars fellas loosen out a bit and talk and then you make great friends. And then even more so you'd make friends with lads on the trip when you socialise.”

The way Sheehy remembers it, the All-Stars Awards weren’t just a night-time function, it was a day long event that was a real test of stamina for the players!

“You'd have a function in the middle of the day so you can imagine the condition of the players later on that night when the banquet took place,” he laughs.

“We used to meet up for a lunch with the then sponsors of the All-Stars, The Irish Nationwide, somewhere off the Long Mile Road where they had a head office. There would be pints flying and you wouldn't want to leave!

“You'd have to go back to the hotel and get ready then for another blast at it at the banquet! But it was great, when a fella has a couple of jars and they loosen up you have good auld banter and good auld craic.”

“I think players deserve that. I always loved the function and the night of the All-Stars awards.”

From the inception of the All-Stars scheme in 1971, the All-Stars Tours have proven to be a big hit with the players.

In recent years the Tours have visited all parts of the globe where players are put up in five-star hotels thanks to sponsors like PwC.

But in the early years, things were a little more rough and ready, with players instead quartered with Irish migrants living in the American cities visited by the tours.

“It was fine, because for the Kerry lads there was obviously a lot of Kerry people living over there who'd look after you,” says Sheehy.

“I'm sure you could be unlucky and end up with a family that were very quiet people, but we were always very lucky I must say with the people that we stayed with.

“When you'd say to the present players that's how things worked on All-Stars Tours back then they'd think it's very strange, but it wasn't. It didn't stop us forming friendships because we always met up with the other lads on the trip.

“It was most enjoyable, I stayed with Ger Power a few times and we were always very well looked after I would have to say.

“In those days the All-Ireland champions as well as the All-Stars teams in both codes would all travel together so the hurlers were there too and you go to know them as well. There was great craic, the socialising was the gem of the trip.

“I don't know what the trips are like now, but in our times the games were only really exhibition games, though I did enjoy every minute of playing with lads from different counties.

“It was really just a great social event and you saw lovely parts of America and made lifelong friends.”

The rivalry between the Kerry and Dublin football teams was an intense one in the 1970s, but it never spilled over into the All-Stars Tours themselves.

“I can't ever genuinely remember of any bad incidents in games or anything,” says Sheehy.

“What I remember about those games is that fellas mightn't be in great condition for them! I played one or two years for the All-Stars and we were beaten playing against Dublin.

“Competitive spirit will always come out in every guy, but it was really just to get the game done with, really. There used be some nice crowds at them, though. It was a great social occasion.

“I got to know a lot of Dublin lads in those games and we always had great craic off the field. When it came to the Championship though it was obviously different.”

Those Kerry and Dublin footballers of the 1970s and 1980s might have been fierce rivals on the pitch, but they developed friendships off it that endure to this day which Sheehy believes is due in no small part to the time they spent together on All-Stars Tours.

“We would absolutely be great friends with them now, they're fierce nice lads,” says Sheehy.

“The last time we would have met them, unfortunately, was at Anton O'Toole's funeral. A lot of us were up at it.

“We would have great friendships with them now, and a lot of the Dublin lads would have come down to Listowel during those years we were playing them and you'd meet up with them and the couple of jars tended to loosen fellas anyway.

“We'd have a great relationship too with a lot of the Cork lads too. Dinny Allen, Billy Morgan, Colman Corrigan, Jimmy Kerrigan, all of those lads.

“We'd often meet them at golf outings and that. I'd say nowadays players seem to meet up more often than in our time.

“We would have usually only met up on trips where you'd begin forming relationships with fellas, but they didn't really blossom until we'd retired because the rivalry would be still there.

“Certainly the All-Stars played a huge part in that.”