Young enjoying his learning curve in green and gold

All-Ireland SFC Quarter-Final

Four weeks ago in Killarney they claimed provincial senior honours for the 73rd time to become the first team to ink their names on this season’s last eight list. He admits that it has been enjoyable to sit back since and observe those that will join them in Croke Park this weekend. There have had their disciplinary travails this season but in general championship 2010 has been an exercise in serenity.

Munster champions. Going through the front door. The calm and easy road.

The current good times are in stark contrast to the black days of 12 months ago. Young remembers last July when the Kerry football pot was thick with rumours and spiced with gossip, as the county team lurched through the qualifiers. Their struggles to tap into a strong current of form received little empathy from the local football cognoscenti. Working for Bank of Ireland in Tralee, Young was exposed to public inquisitions on a daily basis.

He recalled: “Dealing with customers every day, you were hearing absolutely crazy stuff. They’d come in and tell me gossip that was off the wall. Obviously it was a torrid time and we were just grinding out results. There was nothing happening but all the rumours took it out of us I think. It was very frustrating for everybody.”

The rocky road they had travelled made the subsequent All-Ireland triumph all the more satisfying. After the euphoria in the county had dissipated, Young went back to football closer to home. He was eager to channel the momentum towards generating more silverware and in November was at the core of another South Kerry county senior triumph. For all the medals he has accumulated from playing with the division, this particular success carried deeper resonance.

The year before Young had found himself facing a thorny dilemma. Irish supremo Sean Boylan looked to enlist his services for the International Rules series, at the same time as South Kerry were embroiled in a gripping county semi-final saga with Kerins O’Rahillys. Young featured in an engrossing drawn encounter but by the time the replay came around, he was thousands of miles away, hunched over a laptop in Perth listening to Radio Kerry proclaiming a Strand Road success.

He admitted: “It was some tough choice. I felt I might never get the chance again to play for Ireland and instead of waiting for the future, I said I’d go for it. James O’Sullivan was the manager and in fairness he respected my decision and the other lads understood as well. But looking back then, there’s a bit of regret since they lost. I did wonder should I have stayed on.”

Young was still captivated by the trip. He got on famously with his roommate, Wexford attacker Ciaran Lyng and revelled in the opportunity to mix with other players. Australia provided a series of breathtaking sights from the Subiaco Oval in Perth to the glamour of horse-racing’s Melbourne Cup. There was familiarity as well in the school friends from Caherciveen he bumped into in Melbourne.

But having departed South Kerry in 2008, he vowed to make amends in 2009. The divisional concept is one he has always embraced and often ponders whether he could have risen from a small club like Renard to the intercounty stage, without the platform to exhibit his talents that South Kerry offered.

“From outside it seems unusual as to how you make it work. But I’ve been playing for South Kerry since I was 12 and these lads are like clubmates. Coláiste na Sceilge was another massive help. For someone like me, I play for a small club who possibly might not ever get to senior. So I think it’s fantastic and long may it continue.”

He doesn’t forget his roots either. For all the senior All-Irelands he has garnered, he still views the All-Ireland U21 title in 2008 as deeply significant. Young captained that team and his friend Eoin O’Neill entered the action late on to ensure Renard had two All-Ireland winners. The previous September when Young won his first All-Ireland on the field with Kerry, a gesture of huge generosity by captain Declan O’Sullivan saw him bring the cup to Renard on the Tuesday instead of his own club Dromid Pearses.

“The club in Renard have been fantastic to me and it meant a lot to people what Declan did. It was an unbelievable time for us and then when we won the U21, there were fantastic celebrations for myself and Eoin. It’s a small club but a great one. Someone like John Sugrue, who used to train Kerry, had a big influence on me.

“The commitment to come back down from Belfast when he was in college to play for Renard was amazing. Eight hours in an old Jetta when there were no motorways. Unreal stuff.”

Young heads back home often to escape the claustrophobic football environment in Tralee. Last summer it was a release to point the car in the direction of South Kerry and indulge in his favourite pastime of ‘chillaxing’. He has plans to take up golf at some stage soon but it is soccer that consumes him most away from Gaelic football. The trip over to Anfield is one he regularly embarks on during the winter. His older sister Ciara lives on Merseyside and is married to a local, meaning accommodation and match tickets are commodities easily procured.

His pleasure at the club recruiting Roy Hodgson and Joe Cole will be parked for now. A nagging groin injury has cleared up in recent weeks and this afternoon All-Ireland quarter-final in Croke Park is the focus.

The status of Down as opponents brings a touch of novelty that he’s looking forward to. The past has educated him that these days are to be enjoyed.