"The only record I'll probably have is being the most nominated failure in the history of the All Stars, " he told the Sunday Tribune last Wednesday. "I suppose I'm the great 'nearly man'. There's not a chance of me getting selected."

On Thursday though, he got a tip-off that this time the long commute would be worth it. The tip-off was spot-on. On Friday Bradley finally received that first All Star award. Outside Dan Shanahan's selection as Hurler of the Year, there wasn't a more popular announcement on the night.

There is no point in saying it didn't mean much to Bradley. It did. While others would publicly shrug and privately bitch about being so routinely overlooked, Bradley always had the honesty to declare that he had been wronged, and the honesty to say that such candour probably stemmed from arrogance. Remember, this a guy who, when he was 18, went up and told Eamonn Coleman he should be starting, even though Derry had just won the league without him. He duly backed it up, but he has never been afraid to talk the talk as well as walk the walk.

"You could be correct, " he said on the eve of the 2005 championship when it was suggested that his swagger bordered on arrogance. "I think any top forward like Stevie McDonnell or Gooch have this confidence too. I always believe I'm one of the best about and I'll keep believing it and keep trying to prove it."

That he did. He missed out in 2004, possibly because the selection already included one Derry forward, Enda Muldoon, who himself was owed one since his stellar season of 2000. Then in 2005 Bradley was snubbed again. It was a farcical decision. While Peter Canavan only twice scored more than once from play that year, Bradley managed that quota in every one of his 12 league and championship games that year. In the opening round of the championship, he kicked 1-8 from play against Monaghan.

The next day out, Armagh had to move their one defensive All Star, Andy Mallon, off him after 10 minutes before Bradley finished with six points, three from play.

Then he scored 1-4 from play against Down, was Man of the Match against Limerick, before scoring three points from play against Laois. What more did he have to do?

The charge was that he didn't pass enough, but in 2006, Bradley added that dimension to his play. When Derry ambushed the reigning All Ireland champions Tyrone in the opening round of the 2006 championship, Bradley set up Derry's goal and another three scores as well as kicking his mandatory three points from play. Even when Derry's season ended with a humiliating defeat to Longford, Bradley scored an incredible 2-6 from play. If he was from a bigger county, or a smaller one, like Matty Forde or Declan Browne, such a scoring return would been honoured by an automatic All Star. But Bradley was middle cut and again Bradley and justice was denied.

At least he had the consolation of being called up as an All Star replacement for the sun holiday and the All Star game. Bradley duly scored 2-8. "The man was unreal, is unreal, " Armagh's Aaron Kernan would say on the eve of this year's championship clash between the two counties. Instead of merely justifying being on a field with all that talent, Bradley adorned it.

The irony is this year was probably his least spectacular season in ages, if easily the most controversial. In June, failure to deliver against Monaghan in Casement Park was due to an abject team display practically devoid of invention. The fickle nature of football supporters was seen in all its ugly intensity that afternoon.

The Derry followers . . . not the real fans, according to Bradley . . . turned on the players. There was no discrimination in the fact that Bradley's late appearance as a substitute was linked to his recovery from a torn quad muscle.

"They were not the kind of supporters that are prepared to go down and watch us play against Kildare in the National League on a wet February afternoon, " he said. "They were just the type that comes out of the woodwork every summer once the championship comes around, the kind of big mouths that every county has to suffer. I'd be the first to hold up my hands and admit that the Monaghan match was a terrible reflection on Derry football but sometimes you get those kinds of days when nothing goes right. But as a player you have to realise that you're only as good as your last game. And you do have a huge responsibility to the genuine supporters, but the really important thing is to be true to yourself and what you know is right for you and your teammates."

Redemption lay in the qualifiers, both for Derry and Bradley. Suspension for alleged interference with a referee followed a straight red card. The three-month punishment handed down by the game's authorities was the subject of a complicated legal challenge.

He refuses to take the diplomatic option over the twists and turns that were the backdrop to his almost constant headline-making appearances in front of various club, county, provincial and Croke Park disciplinary hearings. He has always admitted that he made a mistake that night, just that it wasn't worthy of a threemonth suspension. "I grabbed the referee to get his attention; I didn't grab him to hit him, " he said on the eve of the Antrim game. "I wanted to know why he got the score wrong but people automatically think you hit him and it's blown out of proportion. The story about me confronting him was written . . . that was the end of me. But he got the score wrong, not just by one point, by two. He made a mistake and I made a mistake by grabbing him."

Three months it was though, or at least, meant to be. It was excessive, Bradley felt. And political.

"What was going on in Derry at club level behind the scenes was a vendetta.

There was a determination to get me sent down the line for as long as possible. There are clubs and individuals that were prepared to go to practically any lengths to try and get me ruled out of the game. It might have been resentment at the high profile I had at the time. You get a certain kind of reputation, one for speaking your mind and for standing up for yourself and you become a target. It doesn't matter what the county. Benny Coulter gets it, Steven McDonnell gets it."

What those two players have over Bradley is they've played for Ireland.

Bradley hasn't, and that rankles more than any previous All Star snub. Again he doesn't want to come across as a moan but again he doesn't hide his true thoughts on the matter either.

"Being chosen as an All Star, at the end of the day, is a very subjective thing. But being chosen to play for your country, you have to go out and live up to that selection.

It's not a retrospective thing based on how you performed in a series of past matches. It's here and now. You have to justify that selection."

Two seasons ago Bradley felt that he had done enough in the trials, kicking 25 points in the last one before the panel was finalised. And yet, somehow, he again missed out.

"[Pete] McGrath however didn't find the time to let me know before I left to travel home that he didn't want to include me in his squad for the trip to Australia. He let me know through a short phone call. Let's say I wasn't that impressed that he hadn't the time to tell me face-to-face. At least the following year with Sean Boylan and Anthony [Tohill] I was given every chance.

In the end it was the fact that I wasn't able to get back to full fitness after injury that ruled me out. It was disappointing. But you learn to live with disappointments."

Patience has its own reward. Last Friday he was honoured and what made it all the sweeter was that his best friend in football, Kevin McCloy, was honoured too. He was touched by the club's gesture as well.

Their original intention was to train on Friday night ahead of today's replayed county final with Bellaghy. Instead they switched that session to Saturday. Bradley deserved to get that award in person.