It was one of those lines of Morrison's that at training had Ger Brady laughing and at home seriously thinking.

Last summer as he watched Mayo from the terraces, Brady would tell himself that time was still on his side to play again for Mayo. He was now 26. Whatever about Mayo, it was time for Ger Brady to rise.

Ger Brady was recently voted the Connacht GAA Writers Personality of January for his performances in the FBD League. He could just as easily have been given the one for February too; he kicked four points against Kerry that month, a tally he ran up against Fermanagh's Shane McDermott last week.

As much as Brady will downplay the importance of both his contribution and the league ("Playing Eamon Fitzmaurice in July, " he contends, "is a different proposition to playing him in February"), watching him this year you can't help but ask two important questions. Where will Ciaran McDonald fit into this side? And where, all these years, was this powerhouse tearing through the middle, throwing all those shimmies?

There were glimpses of it when he was a teenager. He was so good back then, he played three years with the county minors, the first in 1996 when they put him on Noel Kennelly in the All Ireland semi-final. By 1998 he was partnering future rugby international Gavin Duffy in midfield for the minors, winning a Connacht club medal with Ballina and playing wing forward in the league for the county seniors.

Then he was offered a twoyear contract with Connacht rugby. He had always liked the sport ever since Hugh Lynn introduced him to it in the Quay National School, and he had always been good at it too. Ever since he was 14, he'd be constantly invited to all these clinics on kicking, passing and tackling. He had played with the Irish Under18 squad, and then with the under-19s under Declan Kidney and with the likes of Gordon D'Arcy, Johnny O'Connor, Jeremy Staunton and Damien Browne. None of that though had prepared him for life as a professional athlete.

"It was a complete culture shock. Maybe if I had gone to a rugby school and been immersed in that whole weights and rugby culture, it might have been different.

Within three or four months I was starting to get run down. Beatrice McGinley, the physio, noticed my skin was blotchy and asked me was I eating properly. I was also studying in GMIT at the time and typical student, said, 'Yeah, sure I might have a pizza in the evening.' She had to pretty much teach me how to cook a proper meal. I was a cub from Ballina who had only been dabbling at rugby and now I was mixing shoulders with Conor McGuinness, Eric Elwood and Steve McIvor. You'd be lifting weights at seven in the morning three times a week, go home, get breakfast, go to bed for a few hours, and then wake up in the afternoon before going to another training session. It took me longer than others to adjust to that kind of intensity."

He did adapt towards the end of his first year. When the team went to Bedford in England for pre-season camp, he was flying. The climax of the week was a challenge game against the local Premiership team in which Brady, O'Connor and Browne were all handed their first starts. In that game, Brady went to tackle Riaz Fredericks, the big Australian centre and ended up fracturing two vertebrae in his back. By the time he returned, he could only help Galwegians make the AIL play-offs; Connacht's season was already over. As it turned out so was his stint as a professional rugby player.

At the end of the season Stephan Nel told him his services would no longer be required.

Brady was "a bit angry" about both the message and its delivery but he quickly picked himself up. He got a job with Bank of Ireland and threw himself into playing with Galwegians. After a couple of years though he found himself missing his first love.

When John Maughan called him up to the Mayo squad at the start of 2003, he did what his brother David infamously wouldn't do that year and quit rugby. That summer he came on with 20 minutes to go in a tight game against Sligo and kicked two points.

He was brought on in the Connacht final too and instantly kicked a long-range point. "Then Declan Meehan, who is about a foot smaller than me, caught two kickouts over my head, " he winces. "It was embarrassing."

It was also costly. The following year he wasn't invited back onto the panel. When he met Maughan in the players' lounge after the All Ireland quarter-final over Tyrone, Maughan quipped he'd have been out there if he was more committed.

Brady took that as a reference to go back playing club rugby with Ballina at the end of 2003 but maybe it was plays like those Meehan kickouts he was getting at. Either way, Brady says, he doesn't hold it against Maughan.

"I get on well with John.

Himself and David clashed.

They're two personalities who say what's on their minds and sometimes when they clash, you'll get more than just thunder at the end of it. There's no doubt, it had a big bearing on the 2004 final. But when I meet John, we sit down and have a grand chat."

As it turned out, 2004 and 2005 were fulfilling years for the Brady bunch; this time last year, they won the All Ireland club final. When David was fouled that time under the Hogan, Ger was beside him, roaring at him to stay down. There was no need; Brian Crowe blew the final whistle. The next second, Ger's twin, Liam, was alongside them. Before David made that jump and "nearly hit the roof of the Hogan", there's a picture of the three of them grinning, brothers in arms. That was the day David's Holy Grail search ended, Ger maintains. Mayo and 2006 isn't about "unfinished business"; he's just back "to play some ball at the highest level".

It's different for Ger and Liam; they feel they have something to prove. But ultimately the main reason they're on the panel is just to play some ball too. Elite sport is fleeting, Ger realises; last week his old flatmate, Liam Hodgins, finished up with the Galway hurlers.

"Look, I mightn't kick another point all year, " says Brady, who is currently teaching some PE in Ballina before joining the guards in the autumn. "What I'm doing is I'm trying to enjoy the bloody thing. When I was younger, trying to get or keep my contract, I'd put pressure on myself and say, 'I have to play well.' I ended up afraid to make a mistake and went into my shell. At that age it should have been the opposite; I should have had a 'give it a lash' attitude."

He has one now. There's a saying Mickey Moran and Morrison have that has really registered . . . you miss 100 per cent of the shots you never take. Brady had never been known for his accuracy but he's now averaging three points a game. Playing and training with a round ball exclusively has helped too.

"People say a good footballer can quickly transform into a good rugby player, and viceversa. There's only so much truth in that. You could be standing up for six minutes straight for a setpiece in rugby. In football you're on the move the whole time, either trying to keep up with or lose your marker. It takes time to adapt."

Another old boy returned to the fold last week. "For the first minute or two in the dressing room, lads were going, 'Has Mac D showed up yet?' And it was, 'Yeah, he's already on the pitch.' Then we went out and it was, 'How's it going? Good to see you.' Then that was it. We were all training. It was as if he had never been away."

This past few months it's like Brady never was either.