A whole people unchained as Croke Parks turns into a theatre of happy Mayo tears

They can get on with the rest of their lives now.When the hooter sounded, Croke Park descended into a theatre of tears. Joy unconfined. This is what raw happiness looks and sounds like. A scene of smiling, sobbing faces, soundtracked by quivering voices singing songs about winning just once, and soft and craggy boglands. Disbelief in their eyes, too, though. It had happened, it had actually happened. “To every young boy and girl across Mayo and our diaspora across the world, never stop dreaming, stick your chest out and be proud to be from Mayo,” declared Jack Coyne from the Hogan Stand podiumREAD MORE“The wait is over. Sam is home, Maigh Eo abú.”No county has been as wrapped up with a sporting struggle as Mayo had been with their defiant but sorrowful odyssey of 75 years. It transcended sporting conversations many, many moons ago. The search for Sam Maguire became both a north star and an anvil weighing on their shoulders. The moment of liberation felt like a spiritual experience at Croke Park, a cathedral of prayers answered, the non-believers converted. All across the stadium Mayo folk embraced, turning to the person next to them just to confirm they too had witnessed the miracle. Real now. Real forever more. Tears. Joy. More tears.In the moments after the hooter, to those inside Croke Park and the thousands of Mayo folk sprinkled across the globe, nothing else mattered, just this, all because of a group of men who had raged against the perceived prematch wisdom that today would not be their day. They raged and they raged. After seven decades of raging, Mayo were done with waiting. Mayo's Aidan O'Shea doing what many said he and Mayo might never do. Photograph: James Crombie/Inpho “I think of other people that are sick at home and missing out on this,” said Andy Moran afterwards. “I think of the managers, the great people, Johnno [John O’Mahony] got honoured here today, 25 years on from Galway, and just great, great people who sadly are no longer with us. “And I just think of them guys and I’m just deeply honoured to be representing the people of Mayo.”Moran was the general on the sideline when the wait ended but it was a victory for all of those who had toiled over the years – for O’Mahony and for James Horan and for Kevin McStay and for Stephen Rochford and for Pat Holmes and for Noel Connelly and for John Maughan. And for all the players who had been in the trenches, too. Consigned to the dustbin of history now are those platitudes of dying with their boots on. “Even last night I was thinking of Donie Vaughan, Liam McHale, guys that have suffered, not only losing, [but] real heartache in All-Ireland finals and blame for a lot of it,” said Moran. “And I just hope that today puts a bit of peace to them guys. I’m waiting for it to give me a bit of peace, but I’m sure on Wednesday and Thursday, I think I’ll settle.Jack Coyne was just one of many thousands of people to get emotional at Croke Park after Mayo's long-awaited win. Photograph: Ryan Byrne/Inpho “But I’m just so grateful for all the players that have played, all the managers that have managed us over the last 75 years. We’re just the lucky ones that have got over the line.”As the players embarked on a lap of honour around Croke Park, two men linked arms and stood on the railing just behind the press box, swaying from side to side. It was hard to tell whether they were stopping each other from falling or resisting the temptation to take flight.A couple of teenage girls in Mayo jerseys somehow found themselves in the press box, one shaking uncontrollably while trying to steady her hand and record the scene below with her phone. It was impossible not to be moved by the emotion in the place. Rarely has there ever been such a connection between supporters and their team. A people unchained. There was real beauty in those moments after the game.“I know the general narrative was that we had no chance and we were kind of looking at it and we were saying, ‘Hold on here now for a second, Louth beat Armagh, Louth beat Dublin, but we beat Louth, but we get no credit for beating Louth?’,” said Moran.“And we thought this the whole way through. The Monaghan game, we’re like, we win and we still get no credit. Do you know what I’m saying? There was no credit given at any time. So we were like, okay, everyone is writing us off here.“It wasn’t back-to-the-wall stuff, but we had a hundred training sessions done up to this point and we were quite confident that we could give it a good rattle at least.”Mayo manager Andy Moran and his wife Jennifer, daughter Charlotte and son Ollie. Photograph: Tom Maher/Inpho Moran has spent a lifetime down the mine trying to locate this piece of precious silverware. He didn’t manage to find it as a player but in his first year as manager he has struck sporting gold. “I’ve been waiting for this since 2003, probably even before that as a minor, always dreamt of being part of it and now I’m kind of afraid of it. “Jesus, I’m 42 years of age, 43 in November. I’ve been playing for Mayo seniors since I was 19.“I was saying to my wife, she’s born on the third week of September and it was always falling on the days we lost All-Irelands, so she didn’t get a 21st, she didn’t get a 30th. She got her first birthday party last year.“Myself and Jenny, and the kids since they came along, have put our whole lives into this and outside them people, this is, Jesus, I don’t want to get emotional, but there’s not much that’s going to top this.”And you could tell he meant it. This has been the obsession of an entire county. When the people of Mayo wake up tomorrow morning, they can finally get on with the rest of their lives. Chests out. Proud. All-Ireland champions.