IN THE BRILLIANT sports book, ‘Dub Sub Confidential’, author John Leonard lays out the unassailable challenge Stephen Cluxton laid out for him as the back-up goalkeeper with ambitions of becoming Dublin’s new number one.
“When I was training I was trying to get any edge I could. Initially I tried to go in earlier than Clucko but I couldn’t. He was in at five o’clock at training, two hours ahead of everyone else. You could never get there before him.”
That wasn’t just a habit Cluxton formed in response to Leonard’s intent on usurping him. Cluxton saw far beyond the competition that was around him. He was hyper-punctual for a higher purpose and it was something he exhibited from the early days of his introduction to the Dublin senior squad in the Tommy Lyons era.
“Even at that stage, he was arriving early to training and his preparation was meticulous,” says former Dublin defender Barry Cahill. Along with Cluxton, he was part of a group of rising U21 stars making their breakthrough at the same time. Alan Brogan was also in that crew along with Darren Magee and Paul Casey.
“I suppose it took him a while to grow into the role fully. You’re not going to be as vocal at 19 or 20 as you will be in latter years when you become more established. But from an early age, you could see he was the best goalkeeper in Dublin.”
This Sunday, 22 years after his first provincial title, Cluxton will contest for an 18th Leinster medal. A 14th crown in-a-row seems imminent for his county, but you must always account for the margin of surprise that Louth will hope to exploit in what will be a repeat of last year’s final.
In any case, Dublin are an immovable force in the Leinster championship. Getting to this point was something the Dublin players of that early 2000s era felt was a necessary target to aim for if they were to become a team that was worthy of winning All-Irelands.
For this was a time when Dublin were not only a manageable opponent within their own province, they were more than beatable in the All-Ireland stages. After winning the All-Ireland in 1995, they spent 16 years in the wilderness before lifting the Sam Maguire again in 2011. The intervening years were a painful mix of narrow defeats and nightmare meltdowns. A long purge which saw startled earwigs transform into a behemoth.
Stephen Cluxton was there for all of it. He made his Dublin bow in 2001, when he was understudy to Davy Byrne [not to be confused with the defender on the current team]. But by the following year, Cluxton was promoted to first-choice keeper and ended his debut season with an All-Star. Dublin won the Leinster final after beating Kildare, and were denied access to the All-Ireland final after a one-point defeat to Armagh in the semi-final. Ray Cosgrove kicked a late free that would have been the equaliser, but his shot was thrown back into play by the top of the post on the Hill 16 end.
Kildare scored two goals in that Leinster final, courtesy of Tadhg Fennin. Cluxton was a new face in the Dublin team, but not someone they considered a major threat.
“He was kind of the new kid on the block in a way,” Fennin remembers. “We played Dublin in 2000 [Leinster final] and they were kind of between keepers then. Davy Byrne would have been there. That hadn’t replaced John O’Leary at that stage.
“They had this new guy and I suppose I’m small, but for a goalkeeper, he wasn’t as imposing as you might think. He turned into someone who has been that way but at the time, he was a new keeper but it wasn’t something we were concerned about or talked about. Leinster was very competitive in those days and most teams were concentrating on themselves.
“Dublin were vulnerable enough. I suppose it peaked your interest that they seemed to be struggling a small bit at that stage to find a comfortable replacement for O’Leary.”
The early signs about Cluxton’s prospects were promising. And even then, he was showing flashes of the fly ‘keeper tactic that has become a hallmark of the modern game.
“The big thing for us in the full-back line was having Stephen step up as a sweeper behind you,” Cahill explains. “When you’re playing in Croke Park, [it's] such a big pitch. Back then, teams probably played with a two-man full-forward line. You wanted to play on the front foot in the full-back line and having Stephen behind you sweeping definitely gave you a level of comfort.
“He wasn’t a slow, static goalkeeper who stayed on his line. He was happy to leave his area or get out to around the penalty spot or the D if and when required. Any direct ball that might have been kicked into us against Meath or against Wexford or Kildare, you knew Stephen was on his toes.”
“He had played a lot of outfield football at the time so he was a bit of a fly ‘keeper in that regard. He played around the centre-back area a little bit with his club. You could tell he had light feet and a good balance to himself. And he had a nice kickpass out of his hands so he was very comfortable on the ball. He wasn’t going roaming but he gave us a lot of comfort in the full-back line.
“He was well able to keep [up] with everyone in the group in terms of fitness and gym training. That probably wasn’t the case for a lot of keepers in inter-county set-ups back around the early 2000s.”
Of the last 13 consecutive Leinster finals, Cluxton featured in 11 of them. Do bear in mind the two-year break when he wasn’t around between the 2020 All-Ireland final and Dublin’s Division 2 clash with Louth in March 2023. And in those 11 Leinster deciders, Cluxton conceded just four goals in total. There were some big wins for Dublin in that period: the lowest margin of victory was just three points in the 2011 [Wexford] and 2012 [Meath] finals.
But even in the preceding years, when the Leinster championship was not a divine right for Dublin, Cluxton had a good record for keeping his net clean. They reached five finals in-a-row between 2005 and 2009, with Cluxton conceding only one goal to Laois in 2007. Dublin didn’t feature on Leinster final day in 2003 or 2004.
“There were six different Leinster senior champions over a 10-year period,” Cahill recalls. “It just shows how competitive the Leinster championship was then. It was extremely coveted and hard won. For a lot of us who had ambitions of winning an All-Ireland, it was really a case that we had to establish ourselves first in Leinster and become a dominant force in our own province. Then you could start looking at All-Irelands.”
In what has been, and continues to be, a remarkable career, there are few low moments for Cluxton to reflect on. The hiding Dublin received in the 2009 All-Ireland quarter-final, when Pat Gilroy used the infamous ‘startled earwigs’ term, is surely in that lot. The time he was sent off against Armagh in the 2003 qualifiers is another rough memory. There was also the 2010 Leinster semi-final when Meath blasted five goals past Cluxton.
A report in the Irish Independent in the aftermath of that defeat for Dublin indicated that Cluxton “has never looked more vulnerable” as the top choice for goalkeeper. “The goals may not have been his fault, but the challenge from Mick Save, the St Vincent’s keeper, gathers momentum.”
Cahill, who also had the misfortune of playing that game, disagrees that Cluxton was under any pressure at the time. All of those slips have helped to forge the player who now has an influence on every other keeper in the game.
“I was playing in defence that day so we all took collective responsibility that we were a little bit too gung ho and the stability in the back wasn’t quite there. So, what I would say is that it totally changed the philosophy within the group from the management team down to the players.
“We made sure that we’d never be that exposed again in Croke Park in a big game.”
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