by Adam Moynihan

Life can be beautiful and devastating. Sometimes it can be one after the other in very quick succession.

The Sunday before last was a great day to be from Kerry. Our boys put on a brilliant display in Croke Park en route to another All-Ireland title. Driving home with friends the day after we were all still glowing from the night before as we excitedly chatted about the game, and Jack, and Clifford, and All-Stars.

Sam was heading down the tracks before us. We'd all be reunited in Killarney that evening. Everything was right in the world.

Then we got the call. Jamie Doolan was gone. In the blink of an eye, the All-Ireland, that thing that had totally consumed us for the previous 24 hours, seemed meaningless. But as the memories of Jamie rolled in, and the many stories were recounted, the importance of sport came back into view. It meant so much to him and it added so much to his life.

I first became friendly with Jamie when we played on the same St Brendan's senior football team. He was a couple of years younger but he was streets ahead of most of us talent wise. Skilful, stylish, cheeky. The archetypal townie corner forward. He had goals on the brain.

He’s the only player I know of who got called out by his own manager for scoring too much. In one particular match Jamie was doing so much damage our coach Garry McGrath was worried our opponents in the next round would read the match report and target him. “Take it easy with the goals, Jamie.” If I recall correctly it didn’t work and Jamie had to be called ashore. That was the only way of stopping him from banging in the goals.

He was a two-year Kerry minor and in 2008 he was part of the last Kerry team to win an U21 All-Ireland alongside future senior stars Tommy Walsh and David Moran.

He graduated to senior with his club, Dr Crokes, and won a bagful of medals. When he had a particularly good game he used to joke that with the likes of Gooch, Kieran O’Leary, Brian Looney and other great forwards alongside him, he was always marked by the opposition’s sixth best back. But I’ve no doubt his teammates would agree that he was as gifted as any of them.

In recent years he was involved with senior and underage Crokes management teams. They say some great players aren't cut out to be coaches but Jamie didn't fall into that category. He knew football like the back of his hand and he could explain his thinking eloquently and in a very distinct and engaging way.

He was a fiercely loyal Crokes man but at the same time he didn't take the tribalism too seriously. He had Legion friends, Spa friends… In fact, he had friends from GAA clubs all over Kerry and further afield.

On the Sunday night of the All-Ireland, one of the lads got talking to a random Dubliner outside their hotel. When the Dub saw the Kerry jersey, the first thing he asked was, “do you know Jamie Doolan?” He had crossed paths with Jamie in New York many moons ago. That was typical. When people met Jamie, they didn’t forget it.

I was also lucky to have lined out alongside him on the soccer field with Killarney Athletic. He was technically brilliant, a real genie with immaculate footwork that he had perfected on the green in Woodlawn Park with his brother, Shane, and his neighbours and friends.

We managed to finally win the Kerry league in 2017 and my abiding memory of Jamie from that day was when Daithí Casey scored the winning goal late on. Jamie had been subbed off but that wasn't going to stop him from celebrating. He sprinted all the way across to the far corner of the pitch to be with the goalscorer. In fact, he made it to Daithí before a lot of the guys who were actually on the pitch at the time.

That win marked a special milestone for the old stock at the club – some of them had been waiting 52 years for it to happen – and Jamie understood the weight of the moment. He had tears in his eyes as we collected the trophy. It showed what sport meant to him.

All we spoke about was sport, really. He was a proud Evertonian and I suppose with me being a long-suffering Villa fan, we bonded over the shared hardship. He was exceptionally knowledgeable when it came to soccer and he was a great man for the Premier League trivia. “Name six players who…” The next hour and a half would be spent racking your brain trying to remember obscure nineties footballers like Claus Lundekvam and Carl Leaburn. Some craic.

I don’t know if I’ve ever met someone so generous. He couldn’t do enough for you – he really had a heart of gold. When I got into vintage jerseys during Covid, Jamie dropped a bag with some of his old gear up to the house. Valuable stuff he had found in the attic. He flat out refused to take any money for it. “If you send me money, I’m just going to send it back to you.” And he would say it so confidently and with such conviction, the conversation was over.

He was stubborn like that. He could convince you of anything. He would often tell us that he might not always be right, but he was never wrong. How can you argue with that?

The week before he passed I was speaking to someone about my future plans with my podcast. I said Jamie would be an ideal co-host if he’d be interested. Sadly we never had that conversation. There were many conversations that we never had, and I regret not having all of them.

My heart goes out to Jamie’s parents, Eddie and Mags, his siblings Shane, Michelle and Chantal, his daughter Holly and to all his family and friends.

I hope they take comfort in knowing that regardless of whether we knew him for five minutes or for decades, his memory will live on with us forever. That’s just the kind of impression that Jamie Doolan made.