He doesn't like the thought of the letter he wrote to Sean Boylan being in the public domain. He meant every letter of course, it's just he expected it to be tucked away in a box once its words had been ingested, not to be published in his old manager's book. It's strange seeing such a figure wincing like a small boy being asked about girls.

He's not tall but towering. His face is rugged like hardened men on the bog. His clothes are dirty from the half-day's graft he's put in before lunch in his kitchen-making business outside Navan.

It was only on Thursday evening, sitting out at the back of my house with my wife Rhona, that I realised how much I owed you in life. I have a wonderful wife and two lovely kids, with another on the way. That certainly would not be the case had you not guided me so well or given me the opportunities that you did. For the first 19 years of my life I never had won a football accolade . . . not one. And then when I was 20 I won Young Footballer of the Year and an All Star award, but most of all I had an All Ireland medal. I matured overnight and was able to appreciate what we had achieved as a team. . . That new personality helped me to plan my life the way it is today, because before that I was arrogant, immature and disrespectful to myself and others and would not be mature enough to be married with kids today. I thank you so much for that.

You've won two All Irelands, three All Stars, followed the likes of Tommy 'The Boiler' McGuinness, Paddy O'Brien, Jack Quinn and Mick Lyons into the Meath number three jersey and kept your contract. How can you be embarrassed?

"Well I'm a naturally shy person. It's not all I've been embarrassed by either. I felt bad walking back into the Meath dressing room last November having announced my retirement before the 2006 season. I felt I might be resented, but that was maybe just me. I was embarrassed by my attitude and performances through much of this decade as well. I said I'd always try to be an honest footballer but in those last few years I can't say I was. It used to be different though."

Fay was the ultimate fullback of his generation. He can't tell you how he won the All Ireland in 1996, his first year with the seniors, and he's not sure they deserved it. The fact was they did and Mayo's Ray Dempsey will tell you exactly how they won it having been marked by the new kid at full-back in both games.

But Fay can dissect his second climbed peak in 1999, his display as dominant as any that day when Cork were thrust aside. By then Meath had a swagger. But if any story sums up his stature, it was away from Croke Park. In fact it was a mere challenge game between his Trim and a Kildare club. An Australian scout was pitch side that day, watching every kick in his recruitment drive for the Sydney Swans. Suddenly he turned to a local, flicked up his collar and broadcasted, "Sweet f**k is that Darren Fay? What a guy. WHAT A GUY. We tried fisticuffs and football when he played for Ireland against us and we were wasting our time." But that was the old Darren Fay.

In the 2001 All Ireland final he was taken for 10 points by Padraic Joyce, five from play, as his side were annihilated like never before. "That was what's wrong with Meath football. That day. The worst thing was we were walking out of Croke Park after the Kerry semi-final and everyone was delighted and were coming up to us saying, 'About time someone did that to them, God knows they did it enough to Roscommon and Armagh in the late '70s'. Myself and Barry Callahan were coming out listening to all this and he turned and said to me, 'That could do more damage to Meath football than it ever will to Kerry'. Of course I didn't listen to him at the time but he was right. We went into the final in a certain mindset and then Galway started standing up to us. We hadn't a clue what to do. I was wishing the ref would blow it up. I didn't want to know. It hit me hard for a while after that game and that day rocked Meath to its core. We were so cocky. That night we had to go to the Burlington and I ended up sitting beside Colm Coyle drinking at the bar all night. We were trying to drown it all."

Problem was, that day swam and stayed swimming.

The following year Ray Cosgrove scored 2-3 off him. In 2003 Kildare's Stuart MacKenzie-Smith might have only scored once but he won every ball that came near him and set up a winning tally. In 2004 Colm Parkinson hit 1-2 for Laois and was so dominant Mark O'Reilly was moved onto him, while Fay, the liability, was taken away to where his mistakes wouldn't be shown up with such rawness.

"I'd lost my enthusiasm. I wasn't fit and the first thing that happens then is you don't dare get out in front of your man. Before if I didn't win a ball I expected to die. I'd remember tales of training sessions in the late '80s where Lyons and O'Rourke and McEntee and Flynn would beat heads off each other in training such was their commitment and I was thinking I'd never do that anymore. I'd say Sean was aware and so was everyone but at that stage I was living on a reputation, which a lot of fellas do. Sean never said exactly what was wrong but he'd hint at it and maybe say you have to go for a run early in the morning.

"I knew what he was saying and it was more than that but I still never did it whereas before I would have been off running before he finished the sentence. It was bigheadedness on my part. A lot of me was still thinking we should have won another All Ireland.

1997 was the year and that would have made us great. But I was thinking about the past and unwilling to put in the effort to get back near the top."

It was after the Cavan qualifier in 2005 that Fay decided enough was enough. All he had worked for was gone, as was an era of Meath football with the departure of Boylan.

He was only 29 at the time but had seen it all and done it all and when Eamonn Barry asked him to come back, the answer was quick in coming.

Not a chance. Until Barry had gone and Colm Coyle, friend and former teammate, took up the reins. But had Barry stayed on another year, would you have come back?

"Probably not."

So was it an old boy's club?

"No, no. It's just I know what Colm Coyle is all about and I knew if I did my work he'd make sure he got the maximum from the team. So if I worked I knew what to expect rather than things being up in the air come championship. The attributes of Colm Coyle and the attributes of Sean Boylan are more or less the same. Then again Colm learned everything from Sean."

As for today, the cement hasn't dried around his prediction. He knows the best thing that happened the side all year was the defeat to Wexford in the last group game of the league. That day Meath needed to lose by less than eight points and took it to the limit. Coming off the pitch some supporters leaned down over the tunnel and told them they were the most useless shower of c**nts ever to wear the jersey.

"They might have been right. We didn't try. We watched a video and nobody tried and everyone felt bad, which was great, and since then you've seen a reaction from that and that's what that did to us. Against Monaghan.

Against Roscommon. Now we've to keep that level going because Kildare and Meath both go into this game without a whole lot of confidence after the least few years. But I think if we play to our best we won't be beaten."

The success is long gone.

Some of the old swagger still remains.

KILDARE TO TRIUMPH IN HALF-EMPTY CROKE PARK

LEINSTER SFC FIRST ROUND KILDARE vMEATH
Croke Park, 3.50

Referee A Mangan (Kerry) Why not Newbridge, Navan, Portlaoise, Tullamore? Any of those venues would have seen a full house today, but instead the powers that be forgot this isn't 97-98. Despite one winning Division Two and the other advancing to a Division One semi-final last month neither commands the attention or respect they did a decade ago.

The expected attendance of 30,000 says it all.

In truth it's wide open. It probably wouldn't have been had Kildare not lost their starting midfield duo of Dermot Earley and Killian Brennan and the injuries suffered by Tomas O'Connor and Ronan Sweeney have them looking a lot light at centre-field. Step forward Mark Ward and Nigel Nestor who have to stand tall and should do, especially against opposition that lacks mobility.

But it's in the inside-forward line where this will be won and lost and if Kildare can stop Meath scoring goals, they will win.

They've looked secure at the back throughout the league (although we said that last year. . . ) David Lyons has played outstandingly since his move to full-back but has the worrying habit of fielding in front of his man and with Graham Geraghty (right) on the bench and in need of scores for election (about 2-2 looking at the polls) it's a cause for worry.

The other key battle will be John Doyle versus Darren Fay.

Michael Ennis showed how to stop the Allenwood man during the league, but on the bigger surface it's questionable a fullback can do that again. Should Doyle get the upper hand and Padraig O'Neill use his strength to power past Anthony Moyles, Kildare can run up a winning score. They've got into the habit of winning tight games this season too and that will be very useful today.

Verdict Kildare by one and as a direct result Johnny Brady to beat Geraghty to the third seat

KILDARE E Murphy; E Callaghan, D Lyons, A McLoughlin; A Rainbow, M Hogarty, E Bolton; K O'Neill, R Glavin; J Kavanagh, P O'Neill, K Donnelly; T Fennin, J Doyle, M Conway MEATH B Murphy; E Harrington, D Fay, N McKeague; C King, A Moyles, S Kenny; M Ward, N Crawford; N McLoughlin, K Reilly, P Byrne; S Bray, B Farrell, J Sheridan