Gaelic football in Dublin was "absolutely dead and we were absolutely useless."
The Dublin/Kerry rivalry of the 1970s is explored in the new RTE documentary 'Hell for Leather - the Story of Gaelic Football.'
Dublin came out of nowhere to win the 1974 All-Ireland title, capturing the imagination of the capital and sparking a rivalry with Kerry that revived the game in the capital.
That All-Ireland final win over Galway in '74, under the late Kevin Heffernan, got it all going.
Robbie Kelleher - one of the stars of that side - has no doubt about the effect the rise of the Dublin side of the 1970s had on the game in the capital and further afield.
'Gaelic football was absolutely dead,' four-time All-Ireland winner and four-time All Star Kelleher told RTE.
'I often tell a story of a friend of mine who was a teacher in Joeys in Marino, which was a hotbed of GAA and he went into a class of 15 year olds and asked could they name anybody in the Dublin team.
'And not one kid in the class could name one fella on the Dublin team whereas they could have named the Leeds United reserve team at the time
'It was seen as a kind of an ignorant game that culchies played. George Best and Denis Law were the idols.
'Then suddenly after '74 Jimmy Keaveney, Brian Mullins and Paddy Cullen, they were up there with the George Bests and Johnny Giles' of this world.'
That was only the start of it for Dublin: 'Kevin felt you never really won an All-Ireland unless you beat Kerry along the way,' continued Kelleher.
'We beat Galway in '74 and then we were hot favourites against Kerry in '75 and they turned us over.
'Then when we beat them in '76 that was it for Kevin. That was his lifetime ambition achieved and he just packed it up after that. He'd said I've done everything now. We've ticked the box. We've beaten Kerry in an All-Ireland final.'
The year it all ignited though was 1974 and that victory over Galway in the All-Ireland Final.
'It was an extraordinary day because we had come from such low depths,' said Kelleher.
'I don't think they had betting in those days, but if they had, we would have been at least 100/1 at the start of the year to win the Championship.
'I had played for four years before that. We were beaten by Longford one year, Laois another year, Louth another year.
'We won two matches in four years so we were absolutely useless. At the start of the year we were hopeless
'Kevin Heffernan said there used to be more seagulls in Croke Park than there were spectators
'It came from nowhere. We beat Wexford unconvincingly in the first round, Louth in the second round. The big one was Offaly.
'Offaly had been very successful in the early 70s and we beat them in Croke Park.'
Dublin gathered serious momentum from that victory and would go on to soar to new heights.
'Then it just grew from 200 people in Croke Park watching us and suddenly we had 70,000 people in Croke Park,' said Kelleher. 'It was incredible then, the colour and everything.
'Before 74 you didn't have flags and things like that. The day of the All-Ireland in '74, I remember walking out the tunnel for the minor match and just looking up at Hill 16 and saying just wow, the colour was amazing.
'It was incredible and there wasn't great barriers in those days. My great memory from the end of the final in '74 when it was clear we were going to win was Heffo was down at HIll 16 end.
'With 'Sweet Aftan' (tobacco) in his mouth and he was trying to keep the spectators back from running onto the pitch.
'After the match the pitch was crowded and some fella came on anyway and he grabbed the crest off my jersey, ripped it off.'
Kelleher says he could move freely around Dublin without anyone approaching him.
'I think it's very different in a metropolitan city the size of Dublin,' he says.
'If I was a star Kerry player and I walked down the middle of Tralee or Killarney everybody would know who I was. When I walked down Grafton Street nobody would know who I was.
'I am more likely to be recognised in Tralee or Killarney than Grafton Street. It's a bit different. We had a great run. I was very fortunate to be part of a great team at an exceptional time. Do I feel I am part of history? Not really.
'What I think we did do was change the course of the GAA, particularly in Dublin, but even nationwide.
'The image of the GAA changed very considerably, out of the Dublin/Kerry rivalry that existed in the 1970s. You can go through various phases in the GAA. A particularly important phase was the '70s and the rivalry of Dublin and Kerry.
'A lot has happened since then. You look around the clubs in South Dublin and the amount of work that's being done every Saturday morning is just quite incredible, but I think that changed the face of the GAA, not just in Dubin but countrywide.'
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