ARMAGH’S DIARMAID MARSDEN gets questioned about the incident almost once a week.
It’s almost 14 years since Armagh and Tyrone became the first two teams from the same province to contest the All-Ireland SFC final, with Armagh going in as reigning champions.
Marsden’s part in their title defence came to a controversial end in the second half, a memory which will forever live in infamy in the minds of Armagh supporters.
He had never been sent off during his years of senior inter-county service, but a collision with Tyrone’s Philip Jordan that day would alter the complexion of his disciplinary record.
Footage of the incident is in scant supply, but the clips that are readily available show Jordan sprawled out on the deck, while some of his teammates converge vengefully on Marsden.
While the commotion ensued, Marsden wasn’t sure what was coming next as referee Brian White went off to consult with his umpires.
And after assessing the situation, he deemed it appropriate to dole out the ultimate punishment to Marsden.
He didn’t protest the straight red card decision, but it seems apparent, that after all these years, the sting sill lingers.
“It’s something I can’t change now. It happened and in my opinion it was wrong. I didn’t deserve to get a sending off,” he tells The42.
“You do what it takes to win and they did what it took to win. Whether I was on the field or not, who’s to say the result might have been different?
I didn’t deserve to get sent off but that’s something I have to live with.
“When you see your opponent writhing around on the floor as if he was punched by Muhammad Ali, you’re thinking, ‘what’s going to happen here?’
“He (the referee) had consultations with his umpires 35 metres behind and made a decision that you have to live with.”
Getting sent off at a crucial time in a game was a painful sentence in its own right, but the misery was compounded by the fact that it meant Marsden would forever hold an unenviable record as an Armagh footballer.
I was walking off thinking,” he continued,”‘Holy God, I’m the first Armagh player to get sent off in an All-Ireland final.’”
“Shock was the main thing (I felt). It was an injustice.
“Did I put my hands up? Yes. Did I punch anyone? No. When a player comes running at you, you have to protect yourself. I put my hands up to protect myself and suddenly a player is rolling about on the floor.”
Marsden was initially slapped with a one-game suspension for the challenge, which would have ruled him out of Armagh’s opening game of the Ulster championship in 2004.
The decision was overruled following an appeal, which exonerated Marsden of any wrongdoing.
But the retrospective correction could do little to ease Armagh’s pain of losing their All-Ireland crown.
Many argue that Marsden’s absence enabled Tyrone to win that day, with substitute Stephen O’Neill clipping over a few late insurance points to seal the result.
Armagh’s Steven McDonnell had a crucial opportunity to score the only goal of the game, but his resultant shot was snuffed out by the incoming Conor Gormley, who smothered the kick.
On reflection, Marsden is unsure as to what the outcome of the game would have been had he remained on the pitch, but he’s confident that McDonnell’s goal-bound shot would have turned out differently.
“I can assure you that Conor Gormley would have been preoccupied marking me than moving across to block Steven McDonnell’s shot at the end.”
The overall experience of that All-Ireland final was largely an unpleasant one for Marsden.
While the second half of that game brought him emotional pain, the first half smarted him too as he suffered an injury of which few are aware.
“After around 20 or 25 minutes,” he explains,” I got a kick in the head and had to go off to get four staples. For the last 10 or 15 minutes (of that half) I was getting updates from the medical table. I don’t think anyone noticed it at the time.
“I remember when it happened, an opponent’s studs came down heavily on the back of my head. I remember just reaching up and there was blood. I think on the footage, there was a white patch on my head and that was basically the spray to put over the staples.
“Once I got patched up at half-time, I was keen to get back on. There was nothing stopping me getting back on.”
Tyrone of course, were the challengers that day, who bore the undesirable tag of being pioneers of ‘puke football,’ according to some pundits.
That label was inspired by a mad minute of defensive work which Tyrone implemented in their famous All-Ireland semi-final victory against Kerry.
It was a divisive strategy in the eyes of the neutral observer, but as stalwart forward Brian Dooher recalls to The42, any negative noise about their style of play couldn’t encroach on their focus.
“It was really irrelevant. People talk and give themselves a profile and that’s how it is nowadays, the more controversial thing you say, the bigger the profile you get. It keeps them in the media and keeps them in a job.
To be honest, we had bigger things to worry about than some person’s opinion about us, or wanting to stick two fingers up to a pundit.”
There was always something of a rivalry between Tyrone and Armagh prior to their All-Ireland final meeting in 2003, although it ignited to a more intense level in the years that followed.
Between 1999 and 2003, Armagh and Tyrone accounted for every single Ulster senior football title. Armagh triumphed on three occasions (1999, 2000, 2002) while Tyrone picked up the silverware in 2001 and 2003.
It was Armagh however, who won the race to the summit of Sam Maguire, and that sparked something in Tyrone.
Tyrone always believed they were Armagh’s competitive equal, and Dooher concedes that they were itching to surpass their neighbouring county’s achievement.
“We believed we were every bit as good a team as Armagh even before they won the All-Ireland.
“They probably showed us the way and took football to a new level which probably made us raise our game a bit better.
We probably were stuck in our comfort zone a wee bit and they pushed us out of it. If we wanted to do something, we’d have to do it a bit different and prepare a bit better, so Armagh led the way.
Dooher never made a habit of reliving his memories of his playing days with the media, and he can’t recall that he was the last man to hold the ball when the final whistle blew in the 2003 final.
His face is etched in passionate emotion as he stumbles to his knees in front of the Cusack Stand, still cradling the ball against his stomach.
But that’s not how he remembers the moment now.
“You go out to get there and you’ve got there… what do you do now? I don’t know. It’s a relief just getting there because that’s where you wanted to be.
“The whole atmosphere around the whole thing and the occasion is hard to describe. You don’t believe it’ll ever happen and then it did happen. It probably took a long time to sink in, to be honest.”
Armagh and Tyrone will meet again in Croke Park today in the All-Ireland quarter-final [Sky Sports, throw-in 4pm], with Seán Cavanagh the only remaining player from the class of 2003 to withstand the passing years.
Mickey Harte is still at the helm in Tyrone as the longest serving manager in gaelic football, while Kieran McGeeney has transitioned from captain to manager of his home county.
Tyrone are the favourites to emerge from this chapter of their ongoing rivalry, while Armagh have generated some momentum on the back of their impressive victory over Kildare last weekend.
While soldiering together as teammates, Marsden saw characteristics in McGeeney that would make him a strong manager one day.
And he’s pleased to see significant pieces of the jigsaw slotting into place at just the right time.
“The only problem with Kieran as a player, as a captain, as a leader — we followed him because he was doing it, he was leading the charge.
“It’s different as a manager, you’re trying to convince others to do likewise, so it’s getting that message across and bringing everyone with you. I know the type of person Kieran is and he’d have no problem trying to convince people and bring them along to his way of thinking.
It’s surprising that it’s taken this long for Armagh to get back to this stage, but it hasn’t surprised me that they are here.
“All their best players are playing and they’re all committed to the cause. They know how to play for Armagh, do well for themselves and do well for their county. A lot of that is down to Kieran and the boys that are around with him.”
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