“It was a great opportunity for me to remember Mairead so fondly again” – Fitzgerald came through tough times

Kieran Fitzgerald is a gentleman.

He wasn't even talking to me but he didn't have to be. His Laochra Gael is coming up and, of a Monday evening, as we (me and my more experienced journalistic colleagues) chat to him on Zoom, it doesn't take him long to brighten up the day. The odd day, like in most jobs, you're longing for the 5.30 bells so you can get out the door for a few pucks, some fresh air and a bit of craic but 6.00 yesterday and all that could wait. Kieran has suffered his fair share of heart-break down through the years but maybe that explains it. Most players and GAA personalities are very approachable anyway but, as a journalist, it's rare you'll get a fella going out of their way to thank you for everything you've ever wrote about him and everything you've wrote about teams he's played on. It was beyond the call of duty but, as we discovered in the half an hour previous, it's typical of the man.

"I never had any bother with these boys, I want to thank ye for everything" the Corofin man said to a few good GAA journalists who clearly appreciated the thought.

Fitzgerald retired from Galway in 2011 and, watching him lord it for Corofin over the years, I always wondered why. That he lasted as long is a testament to the man himself though because, as Thursday night's Laochra Gael explores, the second half of Fitzgerald's Galway career was overshadowed by immense personal grief. https://twitter.com/SportTG4/status/1491009324340191233 It was in 2007, as a 25-year-old, when Fitzgerald lost his girlfriend Mairead Meehan after a battle with cancer. Fitzgerald, in his own words and quite understandably, became "bitter with life" but, in a bid to take his mind off things, he came straight back into the Galway set-up. He soon discovered that nothing could dull the pain though because, as he told us once before, there were days when, in the middle of matches, he'd find himself staring into the ground thinking of his late girlfriend. On Monday night, Fitzgerald journeyed back to those dark days and told us again how, after winning the Connacht final that summer, the reality of the whole thing hit him like a sledgehammer. "Mairead passed away sadly at the end of January 2007. I took a few weeks off, I don’t think I played any part in that National League campaign, but I was training in the background myself. We had Mayo in the first round, so my sole focus was getting as fit as possible for that. Obviously I had conversations with Peter Forde at the time, and I was aware he was going to give me a massive opportunity to try and make that game if I could get myself to a good position, and I did. "It was like tunnel vision, it was a high profile game against Mayo - they had been in the All-Ireland final the year previous - and my sole focus was that, I wasn’t thinking about anything else. So I did that, thankfully we won and I went well that day. I just realised that evening, I remember being at home that evening and nothing had changed, it was still as (painful) as it was a few months back. We had beaten Mayo and I felt zero satisfaction from it, zero joy. It was still as raw as ever and it just meant nothing to me to be honest." "It was a vehicle for me to take my mind off things for that period prior to the game alright. It did that, but I don’t know what I was expecting after the game - did I think things were going to be different, or my outlook was going to be any different? It wasn’t. The rest of the season, we eventually lost to Sligo, which definitely didn’t help me either, our season petered out - we lost to Meath in the qualifiers. Yeah, it was just tough times." Looking back now, the Corofin icon feels that he should have taken some more time to come to try and come to terms with the situation. "When you’re back and you’re involved in an inter-county set-up, as I said in the doc, you have to earn your crust and sentiment goes out the window. If you’re thrown in against the top inside forwards, obviously, they’re not thinking what Kieran Fitzgerald’s mindset is like on any given day and you know, if I’m off it on any given day, they’ll go to town on you and they’ll seize the opportunity. "In hindsight yeah, maybe that was something I should have availed of. It probably did shorten my inter-county career that I just got back on the road again because as I said, it’s so difficult to maintain form and it probably just compounded my sense of sadness and grief, and accelerated my exit from inter-county." It's obviously a very personal and emotional story to tell but when it was put to him by TG4, Fitzgerald embraced the chance to remember Mairead fondly again. Indeed, most important for him was that the Meehan family - he played with Mairead's brothers Declan, Tomás and Michael - enjoyed the programme. "I suppose to be true to the nature of the programme I had to be as open and as honest as possible and I knew Mairead would have a huge part to play in that story. She was a major part of my life for a lot of years so it wouldn’t be a true story if I didn’t go down that route and tell that story so as I say, it was difficult, it probably brought back old memories that I had put to the back of my head but it was a great opportunity for me and gave me a great platform to remember Mairead so fondly again." And then, like the gentleman he is, he signed off by thanking TG4 for giving him the opportunity to tell his story. "And just a lot of my friends and family, and I know the Meehans have seen the programme already, and I’m just so happy that they’re happy with it and they enjoyed it. So yeah, I was really privileged, so thankful to TG4 and Nemeton for giving me the opportunity to tell that scéal."