For a few moments, away from the centre of the on-field celebrations, Aidan O’Shea stood with his two daughters among the reams of golden streamers scattered across the pitch.He was Mayo’s 18-year-old wonderkid when he made his debut way back in 2009. At the end of too many All-Ireland finals he had stood on the same Croke Park pitch with those same streamers tangled in his studs, and watched others walk up the steps to lift Sam.But the streamers were for Mayo this time.“To quote Rory McIlroy, what will we talk about next year? It’s an unbelievable feeling. It was hard to watch at times, but the boys were just outstanding,” he said with a smile.“Is there any other sporting odyssey left?”O’Shea, a substitute, didn’t see a minute of game time but for the best part of two decades he had been at the forefront of his county’s great longing. Mayo have a few more teenage wonderkids these days and yet one of the biggest cheers for any player lifting Sam Maguire was reserved for O’Shea.“I’m waiting for somebody to come in and say, ‘Oh, actually, something’s gone wrong here and we’ve to take this away’. [The cup] is in the middle of the room there and it’s an amazing feeling,” he said.“Just buzzing for all the boys, the young fellas in particular and the boys, they’ve put in a huge amount of shift. They’ve taken a lot of flak over the last couple of years. Delighted for them to get the performance they got today.”It’s unlikely, though, that anyone has taken more flak in Mayo than O’Shea. He was often an easy target for criticism. But, year after year, he turned up, laced his boots, got his reward.“It’s genuinely not about me. This is all about that group there, Mayo people. When we came in all those years ago, we were all about trying to drive and change the narrative about Mayo people and Mayo football.“We did that to a certain extent but we never got over the line. It’s something that I was hell-bent on doing when I was a young fella growing up. I wanted it to be different, I wanted us to be taken seriously as a football county. I knew All-Irelands would come.GAA All-Ireland Senior Football Championship Final, Croke Park, Dublin 26/7/2026