Times changed as underdogs rally to Royals standard

County boundaries have always provided the most fertile of grounds for deep-seated rivalries in the GAA but some enmities are bred by means other than geography.

Familiarity and failure are usually chief among them.

Offaly’s ability to punch above their weight made them particularly unlikeable to those of us who were coming of age in Laois in the 1980s and early 1990s but, for this onlooker at the time, Meath were never far behind in the unpopularity stakes. At times, they were even top of the list.