Magic Mickey makes it 200

Two hundred not out. It's quite an achievement whether you're a cricketer at the crease looking to land as many runs as possible or someone who loves Gaelic games and seeks merely to get as much out of your career as possible.

And Mickey Burke clearly loves Gaelic games, the cut and thrust of it all, the routine that goes with training and playing games on a regular basis - whether that be for club or county.

These days if an inter-county career extends beyond 30 years old it's noteworthy. Burke is now 38 and on Sunday he made his 200th competitive appearance for Meath in football and hurling - and he was in demand before and afterwards including by people who wanted to get a photograph with him or youngsters looking for him to autograph their sliotar or hurl.

So was this something he had in mind from well out, the 200 that it? Or was it a case of merely taking it one game at a time, one day at a time?

"Jeez, playing 200 games for Meath, never in my wildest dreams," he added.

The Meath Chronicle managed to get a word with him after Sunday's Kehoe Cup loss to Down and some of the hullabaloo had died down. We sat for a few moments in the dressing room and he was in reflective mood. Where had the past 20 years gone he wondered. Twenty years of games, victories, setbacks and craic.

"My dream was to play one game for Meath," he said glancing back to 2004 when he made his debut for the hurlers, turning out in an Leinster championship game against Laois and later that year he was called into the Meath senior football panel by Sean Boylan for a game against Wexford in the O'Byrne Cup. Longwood also won the Junior B in 2004 celebrating their centenary year with some panache.

Burke was on his way and it just continued on from there. New managers arrived on both the county hurling and football teams. They knew what the Longwood man could bring to the table. An intensity, total commitment, a strong work ethic, a burning desire to get the best out of himself, a willingness to contribute to the cause in whatever way he could.

On and on it went. Seasons changed, so did the make up of teams but Burke stayed there. Season after season. He reckons he spent "the guts of 10 years" or more as a dual player, trying to serve two masters. It was as if he was seeking to extend the boundaries of his abilities and energy as much as possible.

"I always tried to make myself available for both when I could, it wasn't easy at times but I was young and the body was able for it, playing Saturday and a Sunday, I wouldn't be able to do that now. It's been a rollercoaster and I'm kind of overwhelmed with the whole thing today but it was really, really nice and something I'll forget."

Supporting Burke on Sunday were several members of his own family including his wife Gemma who had Elsie, their newly born daughter, in her arms. There too was Mickey's mother and father, Bronagh and Stoney, who of course made his own piece of history by playing championship games for Meath at minor and senior level on the same day in Mullingar in 1959.

During his years Mickey had his share of setbacks. Dark days. None darker you suspect than that day back in 2010 when in a Leinster SFC game against Laois in Tullamore when he broke two bones in his leg. Even that didn't stop him.

"I suppose I had a want and will to keep going. I heard murmers, lads saying 'oh you'll be finished' because it's a really bad break, a rotten bad break, I had two bones cracked (fibula and tibia), I dislocated my ankle as well and did medial ligaments in my knee. It was 10 months of rehab. I was the guts of year out."

He got back in the Meath team for a qualifier against Kildare in 2011. He was back on track. "I just love sport, I wanted to keep playing, it was as simple as that. I wanted to get back."

His protracted career would not have been possible without a willingness to make sacrifices; to watch is diet, live a healthy lifestyle, to practice and hone his skills in both hurling and football in his spare hours far from the maddening crowd. Whatever it took, Burke was willing to push on... and on.

"I was very lucky to play for as long as I have. In football terms I was lucky to have played with my heroes like Darren Fay, Mark O'Reilly, Trevor Giles, Graham Geraghty, they were my heroes growing up so Sean Boylan asking me in initially to the football squad that is a memory that live with me always. They were my heroes as a young fella going to watch Meath in the mid to late 1990s. That's something I'm very proud of and I just like to do my club, my family, parish proud."

And it's not over yet. Burke is in with the Meath hurlers and is looking to make the panel for the forthcoming National League and then the Joe McDonagh Cup team. They're the targets. He did his cause no harm with a composed, typically barnstorming, display against Down on Sunday. He's going to enjoy the year ahead whatever it brings at club or inter-county level.

"I'm living in the present, I'm not thinking too far ahead," he added before he was drawn away to a little ceremony that was organised in the clubhouse where he was presented with a Meath jersey with 200 emblazoned on it. Two hundred games. It's quite a milestone no matter what way you look at it.