THERE’S A BOOK in Jordan Flynn’s Croke Park experiences if he ever fancied doing one.

Built around a redemptive arc, it would trace the Crossmolina man’s journey from boy to man to All-Ireland winner, and how it all intertwined with days out at GAA headquarters.

Flynn was just three when, after attending Crossmolina’s All-Ireland club SFC final win over Nemo Rangers there in 2001, he was struck by a car and suffered a pretty badly broken leg. 

Medics wondered at the time if it would heal properly and develop normally. It did, but only after weekly visits to the hospital in Sligo for the next year as he learned to walk again. 

Much later, as an U20 with Mayo in 2018, and fully recovered from his childhood injury, he experienced trauma of a different sort inside Croke Park as he was sent off late in the county’s All-Ireland U20 final loss to Kildare. Enraged and unable to keep a lid on his temper, Flynn shoved referee Niall Cullen before trudging off. He was hit with an 18-week suspension. 

Now in his late 20s, the dynamic wing-forward has come full circle, overcoming those setbacks to play a central role in the Mayo senior team’s epochal All-Ireland win on Sunday, 18 months on from powering Crossmolina to the All-Ireland club intermediate title there. 

“I probably took a lot of heat after that and it was obviously well deserved,” said Flynn, referencing the 2018 episode. “I suppose now getting to look back on everything, (winning) a League, a Connacht and an All-Ireland now as well, getting to look back on that moment and say I could have went one of two ways.

“I could have stayed away from football. In a strange way, I suppose it probably helped me a bit because at the time I was gone, I’d done a lot of partying, a lot of fun stuff and after it was finished, I was like, ‘I don’t really want to do any more of that. I’d like to give it a right crack’.” 

Jordan Flynn and his fiancée Jessie Brown with the Sam Maguire Cup. Tom O’Hanlon / INPHO Tom O’Hanlon / INPHO / INPHO

It hardly helped after receiving the suspension in 2018 that Crossmolina were relegated from the senior championship. 

“Having Tommy (Conroy) and Ryan (O’Donoghue) on the Mayo team that day, you do feel like you let a few people down,” said Flynn.

“There was my family side as well, there was a lot of stuff, (about) my character, and how they raised me and things like that were called into question. That’s not something that you want to delve too much into. 

“The great thing about playing football is that everyone supports you when things go well. People probably don’t see the effect that it can have when things go wrong. People are very quick to tweet or write or comment on things when they don’t really know people too well. 

“When you’re sitting at home after something like that, and you’re reading comments and things like that, you do let them creep in. So it also taught me how to approach things like that. 

“Now I don’t read anything. Whether it’s a good game or a bad game, whether we won or lost on Sunday. It’s great now we’ve won, people say good things. But if we had lost, people would be saying whatever they want to say. 

“You take it with a pinch of salt because you know what you go through as a group and as individuals. That was another learning. So I look back on it with fond memories and also, I would say, with not so fond memories as well. It definitely was a turning point for me as well.” 

Mayo's Jordan Flynn and Kobe McDonald ready to lift the Sam Maguire Cup. James Crombie / INPHO James Crombie / INPHO / INPHO

After last year’s intermediate win at Croke Park with Crossmolina, beating Ballinderry, Flynn described it as “one of the best days of my life”. Sunday may have surpassed it although it wasn’t always certain he’d be around this year as he considered not returning.

“When you’re playing football for that long, it kind of becomes very taxing,” he explained. “Obviously you’re enjoying playing football and I would never have stepped away because of the football side of it. It was more from the side of, like, I’m getting married at the end of this year and there’s things you are missing out on. I have a lot of friends that I wouldn’t see as often as I’d like. 

“They are going to concerts or group holidays or whatever. My partner, Jessie, is great and keeps me grounded. But there’s also some things that I feel she misses out on because of where I am.” 

One of the things that convinced Flynn to stay was the prospect of playing alongside his brother, Kobe McDonald. And so, at full-time last Sunday, with Kerry defeated, the pair embraced and crumpled to the turf. Later on, they lifted the Sam Maguire Cup together.

“I think we were just saying to each other, ‘It’s over now – it’s done!’” recalled Flynn. “You talk about it, and you talk about what you could do, and what it would be like, but to actually do it then and kind of get to experience it is a different story.”