Ready for the next chapter

THE reel of the story is well-worn now, but Aidan O’Rourke’s face still lights up when reminded of the message left at each bedroom door of the Armagh team on the morning of the All-Ireland final.

There, in black and white, Muhammad Ali was wishing his Armagh brothers good luck in their impending battle with Kerry. It was Joe Kernan’s final gambit to ensure the focus and intent of minds never wavered. Lodged somewhere in the back of their heads was the notion the Louisville Lip was rooting for them.

“Absolutely amazed,” O’Rourke reflects now. Like so many athletes, the wing-back counted the Greatest as his hero but for years, only knew him through the occasional fight on video and the pages of books. And there were a lot of pages and a lot of books. Few subjects have claimed more forest than Ali.