THEY MET three times last year and have already met once this season but, like all classic sporting rivalries, the next game is the only one that matters as Dublin and Westmeath prepare for Sunday’s Leinster SFC semi-final at Croke Park.

While the memory of last year’s two-point Leinster defeat by the Dubs still rankles – and they took a particularly heavy pasting from them in 2006 – Westmeath can take heart from knowing that they are actually the last team to beat Dublin in the Leinster championship.

“To be honest I hadn’t even thought about that,” said their two-time All Star captain, corner-back John Keane.

“That just seems such a long time ago now,” he said of the Lake county’s ’04 memorable quarter-final victory that helped spark their memorable run to a Leinster title under Paidi O Se.

“We beat them by two points that day and I remember Padraig Conway got the insurance point at the end.”

HAPPY

”But the big thing about ’04 for me was that it was my first day playing Dublin in Croke Park in front of such a huge crowd and I remember going home very happy.”

But for Dublin fans, and then manager Tommy Lyons, it was a very different experience.

Lyons got it in the neck for leaving Barry Cahill on Dessie Dolan for so long when he was struggling after coming back from a long-term injury.

Dublin’s inability to hold onto their lead – and the lack of a metronomic free-taker – also saw Lyons come in for heavy criticism and when his term finished the following autumn, he was replaced by Paul Caffrey.

But Westmeath’s memories of their championship clashes with the Blues since that day are not quite so happy, so they will not need extra motivation on Sunday.

Particularly disappointing was last year’s two-point defeat after a game in which they scored their first SFC goal against Dublin in 41 years, raced into an early four-point lead and only trailed by one with three minutes remaining.

“Losing to them last year really hurt because our minds were totally focused on winning Leinster,” Keane said. “We had beaten Dublin in a league final (Division 2), we were well set up for it and we just didn’t take our opportunities.

“It wasn’t just about our wides (five in one nine-minute spell). In the fullback line, we gave away some handy frees too and all that helped Dublin. We all made mistakes.”

Westmeath’s memories of their ’06 championship meeting were painful too as they were, mortifyingly, restricted to just five points in an All-Ireland quarter-final.

“We had just had a good run through the qualifiers (beat London, Limerick, Sligo and Galway) and I don’t know what happened but none of us seemed to turn up, we just played very badly and got a right good beating that day,” Keane said.

If anyone was judging Westmeath on league form this year, they would be telling them not to bother turning up as they took an unmerciful drubbing – 5-22 to 0-10 – from the new-look Dubs in the last round of the NFL.

“We were depleted and had lost a lot of games and they were looking to win and, in fairness, were superb that day and absolutely turned us over,” Keane said. “But you don’t dwell on that or league performances when it comes to the championship.”

Westmeath were particularly unlucky with injuries and absences during this year’s league. They did not exactly inspire optimism by only scraping past Wicklow in extra-time in their Leinster opener, but that game noticeably marked the return to action of a lot of key players after extended lay-offs; not least Martin Flanagan, Dolan, Damien Healy, Donal O’Donoghue, Michael Ennis and David O’Shaughnessy.

MISTAKE

“We actually started the league quite well,” Keane said. “We were giving Galway a good game in the first round when myself and Francis Boyle made a mistake and let them in for a goal. “We actually gave Tyrone a good game too, but after that everything just went wrong and we had a terrible run.”

But Keane prefers to believe that being so heavily depleted during a win-less league run could yet have a pay-off when it matters most. The addition of a few new faces such as St Loman’s Conor Lynam, a useful forward who made his SFC debut against Wicklow, gives rise to some optimism.

“It gave a lot of new players a chance and a group of U-21s came in and got plenty of experience,” Keane said.