It’s a conversation every parent knows is a possibility but you’re still hopeful that it won’t happen. For me, it was five years ago.

“Dad, I want to join the local soccer club,” the young fella said.

He didn’t want to give up GAA and that was nearly worse from the point of view of an unpaid taxi driver and laundry maid, with twice the fixtures and the sets of gear. The biggest fear was the levels of absolute nonsense that he’d be exposed to. It’s something that I saw for myself in the season just gone: with him now playing at U14 level, I couldn’t keep getting away without being involved in the team.

Essentially, the world of soccer is a one trickle-down operation. For instance, top players cut the feet off their team socks and wear special white socks that fit perfectly around their feet, so that’s why young fellas put white ankle socks from Dunnes over their socks when they play soccer. But that’s only the tip of the iceberg of multi-coloured boots.

On television, you sometimes see a corner-taker raise one or both arms to signal to his team-mates where the ball might be going – we had a lad who did that despite the fact that we had never practised set-pieces and then, when we actually got a goal from a corner once, the scorer celebrated by putting the ball under his jersey and sucking his thumb. That’s a popular celebration for professionals whose partners are expecting a baby, but thankfully our lad wasn’t in such a situation.

Premier League habits

In the Premier League, it’s popular for a player being brought off after a good performance to applaud all four sides of the ground as they give him an ovation, but it doesn’t really have the same effect at a deserted schoolboys’ league pitch. Similarly, while stars will cover their mouths when talking to each other on the pitch as they’re paranoid that the tabloids might run a story where a lip-reader interprets what they’re saying, there’s not as much of a need for teenagers to do so – but they do.

Beyond the performance art, we actually had quite a good team, helped by the prodigious goalscoring of Ben Murray. Ben’s parents are from here, but they only returned to the area in the past year, having lived 20 miles away in Rockfort. While residing there, Ben had begun his “career” with the local side Templemichael Rovers, with whom we shared a division.

As he had done all season, Ben found the net at home to them – but, keen not to upset the non-existent visiting supporters- made a big point of being seen not to celebrate. A week later, though, we played Kilkerran United and, after completing his hat-trick from the penalty spot, Ben knelt down and kissed the turf before pointing to the sky.

Fearful I’d missed a funeral, I asked his father Brian if there had been a recent loss, but he said no, Ben was lucky to still have all four grandparents still alive and this was just something he’d seen a player do.

“Over wah”

While Ben was an addition, early in the campaign we lost Fionn Desmond, who wanted to play rugby for Glanduff. In the style of a player transferring clubs in soccer, he posted an emotional message on Instagram. “It’s been a dream to wear the orange and navy, but it’s time for a new challenge to help my own personal growth. I’ll treasure the memories I’ve had over since the days of U8s and hopefully I’ll be back at the Town Park cheering on guys who started off as team-mates and became friends. Don’t think of this as goodbye but rather over wah.”

I’m not sure if the rugby lads were able to improve his usage of French, but they only had three or four months in which to do so. When Fionn realised that rolling around feigning injury didn’t butter much parsnips on a rugby field, he abandoned plans to become the new Jonathan Sexton and he was indeed back at the Town Park playing for us again, having said “over wah/au revoir” to rugby. Some might have been humbled by such a reversal but he revelled in it: channelling his inner Michael Jordan, he simply posted ‘#IMBACK’ on his Insta.