AFTER the final whistle blew on Donegal’s season last year at Croke Park, fans, pundits, and perhaps even Jim McGuinness and his squad, began dissecting where they went wrong and the what-ifs of making it to the promised land of the All-Ireland final.
One of the undoubted questions that came up would have been, ‘What would Murphy have done?’
Could he have tied on a crucial, late score against Galway? Could he have outsmarted the Armagh defence and secured one of the best comeback stories in recent Gaelic football history?
All of these questions are valid but, in the end, pointless. However, now, we may get answers to those questions when the Glenswilly giant makes his return to the inter-county season next year.
But one question still lingers, ‘Why now?’
“You’d have to say the rules change would be one,” said Brendan Devenney, a former Donegal teammate of Murphy.
“I would (also) say his love for Donegal.
“I know he has been playing club and done bits of media but I’d say I wouldn’t know anybody who...just his life was GAA and, especially, Donegal for all that time.
“There’s so many aspects to that you know, the buzz of playing, the lads and I guess if you look at Donegal last year, I mean if he’s sitting watching us, let’s take it to the Galway game, the last game, could he have made an impact?”
Last summer’s semi-final loss against Galway would have been a game that the former All-Ireland-winning captain would have been licking his lips at, as there was plenty of opportunity for a late score that could have changed the course of the game in Donegal’s favour and early on, there was plenty of balls dropping short of the mark, an issue Murphy rarely has on his hammer of a right leg.
Devenney agrees with this assessment, as the former St Eunan’s and Donegal full-forward backed his former county colleague.
“I always thought with him, being the player that he was, it might be hard for him to do a certain role for Donegal but maybe over time he softened to that and was saying ‘Right, maybe there’s a role, different games you might start, different games you might come in’.
Devenney highlighted the rule changes as being a potential factor of Murphy’s return, as some of the new proposed changes by the FRC would make it easier for 35-year-old Michael Murphy to integrate into the modern game, with the likelihood of him being drawn to his own 21-yard-line by a breaking fullback less with the new 3v3 rule.
“I think Michael’s attributes aren’t box-to-box the way football’s been going these last 10 years...he’s gonna bring the elements that other players don’t have, there’s no point in saying he needs to do some of the what you would call ‘workman’-like stuff; going up and down the pitch, carrying ball and taking ball, Donegal would, I think, need a certain role from him,” said Devenney, who played with Murphy from 2007 until his retirement in 2009.
The overwhelming emotion among football fans both in Tír Chonnaill and beyond is one of relief and caution.
Relief that a player of Murphy’s quality is returning and caution that Donegal’s already talented side has just added another arrow to their quiver.
The former is true of former Donegal manager Declan Bonner, who currently manages Fermanagh senior champions Erne Gaels of Belleek.
“It’s great news, absolutely delighted that he’s back in and I suppose that when you see Paul Conroy at 35 get Player of the Year in 2024, listen, Michael looks after himself well and he’s a professional athlete and hopefully he can avoid injury and have a major role to play in 2025,” said the two-time Ulster SFC winning coach.
“I do believe a fully fit Michael Murphy is going to have a huge amount to offer Donegal, whether that’s in the dressing room or at team meetings, the way he leads is going to be massive for us moving into next season and it could be that final piece of the jigsaw.”
Whatever may come, Division One should be interesting next year with potential rule changes and a Michael Murphy itching to get back into the swing of things a recipe for potential mayhem.
