Mick the Monarch 

Michael "Mick" O'Connell was born 4th  January 1937. His league and championship career with the Kerry senior team spanned nineteen seasons from 1956 to 1974. O'Connell is widely regarded as one of the greatest players in the history of the game. By his late teens O'Connell had joined the Young Islanders, and won seven South Kerry divisional championship medals in a club career that spanned four decades and included a spell playing with Waterville. He also lined out with South Kerry, winning three county senior championship medals between 1955 and 1958. O'Connell made his debut on the inter-county scene at the age of eighteen when he was selected for the Kerry minor team. He enjoyed one championship season with the minors; however, he was a Munster runner-up on that occasion. O'Connell subsequently joined the Kerry senior team, making his debut during the 1956 championship. Over the course of the next nineteen seasons, he won four  All-Ireland medals, beginning with lone triumphs in 1959 and 1962, and culminating in back-to-back championships in 1969 and 1970. O'Connell also won twelve Munster medals, six National Football League medals and was named Footballer of the Year in 1962. He played his last game for Kerry in July 1974. The last line in the penultimate verse dates the song circa 1972-73.

You people of Kerry who favour the game,

Of pure Gaelic football, I’ll sing you the name,

Of one of our champions whose like was ne’er seen,

The man from Valentia who dons Gold and Green.

Yes, famed Mick O’Connell already is crowned

The king of clean football in each Gaelic ground,

But gems that illumine that crown one and all,

Have no lustre like Mick, when he leaps for a ball.

Like the lithe curving salmon that leaps high and clean,

Whose grace, power, and beauty with wonder is seen.

So too with O’Connell who charms the eye,

With movements majestic, on ground or in sky.

They came from the South, the North, East and West,

To mark Mick O’Connell but vain was their quest,

With super-fired football he mastered them all,

A conjurer deft with the spherical ball.

The Kingdom can boast of great stalwarts ‘tis true,

Far famed for its football from Puck to Peru,

But one that will ever stand out on his own,

Is Royal Mick the Monarch sedate on his throne.

The star that led forth the wise we recall,

As Christmas is nigh there’s peace over all,

While the star of Valentia inspires you and me,

With hope for the final Nineteen Seventy Three.

Then here’s to O’Connell the flower of them all,

The game’s greatest hero, the king of football.

Long, long may he reign in the Kingdom supreme,

A leader beloved of the Kerry fifteen.

1972-73 edition  An t-Oileánach,

The Voices of Valentia,