In the years to come, everyone in Edendork will talk of Conn’s chip up and Niall’s free. None of it happens if it isn’t for Conn Kilpatrick’s almost invisible decision ten seconds earlier.

WHAT about big Conn’s chip up?

Bravery comes in different forms.

But rewind the tape ten seconds and you will find the moment Edendork won their first ever senior championship.

Niall Morgan has come out to take the free just shy of halfway.

Errigal Ciaran are full press.

If they can force the free long, they win the game.

If they can put enough pressure on the short to even break it away, they probably win the game.

Nine times out of ten, Errigal win the ball that spills loose at Kilpatrick’s feet.

Go back and watch his movement.

From long before Morgan kicks the ball, Conn Kilpatrick had decided that he will be the man off the shoulder to take the second ball.

He spots early where the best out-ball for Morgan is.

So he vacates the spot he was operating in, drags Aodhan Quinn to the other side out of that zone, all in the knowledge that he’s taking off in the direction of where the ball is going.

By the time Morgan kicks it, Kilpatrick has already seen the danger of what might unfold.

He breaks a split second early and adapts his run because he knows off the shoulder isn’t happening.

That nice second ball he’d hoped for is coming to him on the floor.

There is luck in how it breaks. It could have gone anywhere.

But had he not pre-empted it, he’d have been nowhere near where it broke.

The pick-up that followed, the driving run, the mid-air roll to buy those extra two or three metres, Morgan’s kick – those are the moments that will forever be etched in their minds.

None of them happen without Conn Kilpatrick reading the play first.

Gaelic football is a crazy game in the best sense of the word these days.

The margins between winning and losing are often infinitesimal.

That free Morgan took reminded me of the one Gavin White got pilloried for against the same opposition in the All-Ireland club semi-final two years ago.

One more ball and Crokes are over the line.

But White had nowhere to go. There was no run that came to him, no 100% ball. He did absolutely the right thing by lacing it down the field because that was the percentage play.

Crokes lost the ball, Errigal scored the equaliser and went on to win in extra-time.

White got absolutely hammered for it when it was not his fault.

Much of Monday’s sporting debate centred on the end of the Galway football final.

Peter Cooke had just landed a two-pointer a minute into stoppage time to push Moycullen away from Salthill-Knocknacarra.

One more play.

Moycullen stayed pressed up.

John Maher makes a great fetch and lobs in the kick pass. Suddenly Salthill have numbers in behind. Tomo Culhane finds the net.

Put yourself in the position of the Moycullen management and players.

What do you do in those handful of seconds you have to decide?

Do you drop off the kickout and get back, or do you stay up and try and win the ball knowing that if you get hands on it at all, the game is over?

Foul? You’re right in black card territory, no matter where on the pitch. You hand Salthill the last attack in an 11v10 situation. Time becomes indefinite because the ref has to stop it for the card. He’ll add a bit on and you’ll play that bit a man light.

The right answer is only found in hindsight.

Moycullen pressed up. They got caught out the back.

The decision they made had consequences but that is not to say the decision they didn’t make wouldn’t have had them too.

We are all very quick to jump on the explanations that put things in nice, neat boxes that we can quickly pack away.

Mayo’s high-pressing game won them the All-Ireland.

But it almost lost them the All-Ireland too.

In the space of three minutes when Kerry were five up, Tom O’Sullivan and David Clifford both missed two-point attempts. O’Sullivan was wide for a one as well.

If those five go over, Kerry are ten points up and they are not losing from there.

Even go right back to the Meath game where it all turned. They were getting railroaded in the first 20 minutes. Opened up at will.

If they lose that game, even by a point, does Andy Moran go away and question everything about what they’re trying to do?

In short, the result doesn’t always fully determine the rights and wrongs.

Coaching is tough.

Sometimes the plans are terrible but if the players executing them have enough quality, you might get away with it. Next thing, people are calling you a genius.

Other times you can have a great plan that you’ve rehearsed to a tee, and the players don’t execute it. So you get called an idiot, because people only see what they see.

Managers get frustrated with the media because we don’t always know what they know and the questions posed in post-game situations sometimes reflect that.

The margins between winning and losing are so fractional that they are practically invisible.

They are sometimes lost, buried deep beneath the moments that make the highlight reel.

Winning is never one thing. It is a collection of thousands of almost invisible moments.

In the years to come, everyone in Edendork will talk of Conn’s chip up and Niall’s free.

None of it happens if it isn’t for Conn Kilpatrick’s almost invisible decision ten seconds earlier.