Inside Aodán Mac Gearailt's Kerry role: 'You have to protect them from themselves in a way'

And how he regenerates and reflects by the golden sands of Béal Bán with Kobe. Not McDonald but Mac Gearailt’s five-year-old golden retriever. In his own way that Kobe has been invaluable to a setup too.

“I walk the dog first thing every morning,” says Mac Gearailt. “I genuinely think about things. What was said to me. If you listen to the players and to the right people, they will provoke some thoughts. But then you obviously need time to just digest all that. Sometimes there is such a thing as having too much information and you can get sidetracked into stuff that isn’t that important.

“It’s a very quiet road where I walk. I usually meet Louise Ní Mhuircheartaigh’s mother Noreen but it’s very quiet. Then you come down to the beach. Kobe likes to go for a swim. Sometimes I join him. I joined him this morning. Towel back around the shoulders, then up the road again. Just that hour to yourself – and Kobe – I find it helps me.” 

He needs it, especially in his role. One of his primary roles is to liaise between the players and the S&C and medical team. In a season where Kerry have been down a handful of All-Stars for large tracts of it, rarely has the county required it more. With a primary degree in physical education from his days in UL though, Mac Gearailt was happy to dive into it.

“I find it fascinating. I’d have a sitdown meeting with [S&C head] Jason McGahan and Paudie McQuinn or one of other physios before every single training session. And that’s after phone calls to various other people. Certain aspects of training might be fine for lads; there mightn’t be a lot of accelerating and decelerating. But then other parts mightn’t be suitable for them. So you’re trying to get them back into the football, but in a way that is safe for them.” 

That sometimes has meant playing the bad cop, as in telling them what they might not want to hear. No, Paudie, you’re not quite yet ready. No Seánie, you’ve to wait another week for that. I’ll be telling Jason and Cian we’ve only 24 lads able to go full out tonight and you’re not one of them. He has found though like so much else with this group of players, they tend to police it themselves.

“Sometimes you have to protect them from themselves in a way, because they’re anxious to get back playing and on the team. But the leadership group had a chat around this during the season. If the decision made by the S&C and medical team is you’re only to do this block and Aodán either pulls you in or out of something, you’ve to go with it. It’s not up to you. And in fairness they’re mature enough to realise that. As much as lads are afraid of being dropped or left behind, there has to be that element of trust.” 

Mac Gearailt commands such trust and respect, by virtue of his training and personality. His An Gaeltacht clubmate Tomás Ó Sé long earmarked him for a role like his current one.

“Even when we were students [in Limerick], we’d train away ourselves, using pre-season drills he’d have picked up from English soccer players,” Ó Sé wrote in his autobiography, The White Heat.

“Of all the guys I saw, Aodán was the one who minded himself more than anything. A really good example to me on how you should eat and hydrate and rest. He was well ahead of the times and a player who really got the most out of himself. He was great craic; he spent one night over in Cape Town duelling songs with [Séamus] Moynihan and they were like two rappers making up songs. But he took preparation absolutely seriously, to the point where it’d nearly annoy you. He was always very well organised. Coaching would suit him.” 

And yet when Jack O’Connor rang him in the fallout from the 2024 All-Ireland semi-final defeat to Armagh, Mac Gearailt himself was surprised it was to invite him into his setup.

“I wasn’t expecting it. I thought he was just picking my brains about players, because that would be something Jack would do, ringing around ex-players to see how guys are getting on in club games and what your take on this might be. And that’s how the conversation started.

“Then typical Jack, he said, ‘You might have a think about coming in with us.’ So I went home having told him I’d have a think about it. But there wasn’t much thinking to be done, to be honest.” 

You could see why O’Connor identified him. Before taking up an Irish language officer position with Kerry county council in recent years, Mac Gearailt served for over a decade as principal of a secondary school in Castlegregory where his work prompted him to be honoured a national People of the Year award.

A former pupil, Hannah Hennessy, who suffered from a chronic depression, nominated him. “The first day of meeting him, Aodán told me he was there for me, that I could go to him anytime to talk to,” she’d write. “He would check on me daily. His office door was always open. On the days when I was thrown on a seat in the corner by his office, crying for no reason or not able to talk or stay in class, he was there with a cup of tea. When I was put into hospital in Cork for over three months, Aodán would often call the hospital to chat with me and see how I was.

“He got me back playing my football with the school team and helped me all the way. He saved my life.”

Then to go with his people skills and PE training was his knowledge of football. In a coaching ticket coming down with specialists, he keeps a particular eye out for wing forward play, a position where he kicked three points to win the 2000 All-Ireland final replay.

Naturally so, he highly values wing forwards who can take scores or kick the ball inside for others. But just as important for him is the less glamorous stuff. The capacity to tackle around that middle third, win the breaking ball.

“Or a lot of the time all you’re doing is being in the right place at the right time to cover a kickpass. And no one notices that. But if you’re not there, that ball goes in and there’s a score. A lot of wing forward play goes unseen.” 

A bit like the work of a selector. But likewise highly valued within this Kerry setup.