“So, goals from a sporting sense would be to try and improve and push on and be better, maybe to dominate games a bit more, be more consistent in games, potentially stuff like that…”
Words like those might be expected from a teenager trying to make a breakthrough, or a player who’d just had his first senior season.
The fact that they were uttered by Brian Fenton at the age of almost 28 go some way to explaining why he became one of Gaelic football’s all-time greats.
It wasn’t just the Dublin star’s age that was notable, of course. That was February 2021 and he’d just been named PwC GAA/GPA Footballer of the Year for the previous season, the second time he collected the top individual accolade. He also had five All-Stars from his six senior seasons to that date.
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The Raheny man’s retirement from inter-county football at the age of 31 has come as a shock, but although he could probably have gone on to achieve even more, he’d already done more than most.
Although that interview was conducted online, the genuine nature of those remarks was clear. This was not false modesty but rather the reality of how Fenton viewed himself and his performances. In his mind, there was always room for improvement.
Although he often soared high to pluck opposition kick-outs from the sky, Brian Fenton’s feet were kept on the ground at home.
Family can be the greatest supporters and also the greatest critics. The first time he was named GAA/GPA Footballer of the Year, in 2018, Fenton revealed that his father – also Brian – constantly reminded him that “I wouldn’t lace Jacko’s boots!”
Brian Snr was surely only joking, that jibe based on him being a Kerryman like the legendary midfielder of the Seventies and Eighties, Jack O’Shea.
Certainly as unbeaten championship season followed unbeaten championship season Fenton’s son rose higher and higher in the public’s estimation.
Brian Fenton played a huge part in Dublin exceeding Kerry’s record, not just with the first ever five-in-a-row but by taking that to six-in-a-row in 2020.
Earlier that year in a public vote conducted by RTE Fenton was selected alongside O’Shea at midfield on a team of All-Stars in the ‘The Sunday Game’ era. Eighteen months earlier, when he won his first Footballer of the Year accolade, Fenton had said “to even be in the same sentence as him is just very, very incredible” – but there’s no doubt he was well worth that place.
Dublin’s altered tactical approach after their stunning semi-final defeat by Donegal in 2014 was an important element in their ensuing years of dominance – but so was the involvement of Fenton.
His desire to better himself made Dublin better and better.
That aspect was obvious from the outset, even if the potential he had wasn’t obvious to some. Cian O’Sullivan, who played the vital sweeper role from 2015 onwards, recalled that when Fenton became part of the senior set-up in that post-Donegal era he did not foresee greatness from the Raheny man.
However, Fenton’s appetite to learn was evident – and by the end of the 2016 season Sullivan knew that his colleague was someone special:
“First impressions were like ‘No, this isn’t the superstar’, but he’s just a really attentive and diligent guy. Any feedback he received from management about what he needed to work on, he worked on that and he was extremely committed to getting into that team.
“He just improved training session on training session and, once he got his chance to start, he’s just taken off from there. It’s great to see that, if you do want this and you’re willing to work hard enough and dedicate yourself to it, that it can pay off.”
Of course Brian Fenton had great physical attributes: 6′6″, lean but powerful, able to make and take the hits, leap high and also cover the ground with rapid, rangy strides, a creator and supplier for team-mates as well as a regular scorer.
Yet it was his attitude, his approach that made him outstanding.
On and off the pitch, Fenton was ‘a gent’; his regular support for the St Paul’s Minor Club Football tournament up in Belfast, was just one example of what he gave back to the game that made his name.
After the 2023 All-Ireland SFC final, he consoled beaten Kerry captain David Clifford rather than rushing to join in the celebrations.
What was remarkable about his reaction that earned him a red card in this year’s Division One final was its rarity. For a player always in the midfield melting pot, where the battle for ball was hot and heavy, Fenton always seemed to keep his cool.
He was the man who couldn’t be beaten, but no matter how much opponents tried to ‘hammer the hammer’, target the Dubs’ main man in there, he wasn’t one for pulling a dirty stroke.
Even his angry shove of a Derry opponent was understandable, a consequence of the Raheny man being struck late by a closed fist tackle.
It was also a reaction to being behind in the game. Because, despite all he’d done, all he’d won, Fenton still hated losing.
Famously he wasn’t beaten in a championship outing with Dublin from his debut in 2015 until the 2021 semi-final against Mayo – and even then the westerners needed extra time to dethrone the holders.
Typically of Brian Fenton, he worked harder to get Dublin back to the top, including scoring two superb points in the 2023 All-Ireland final against Kerry as he won his seventh Celtic Cross. Late last year he collected a sixth All-Star – matching the great O’Shea’s tally.
His departure is unexpected, and the Dubs will hope he changes his mind, but even if he doesn’t his place in the GAA pantheon is absolutely assured.
