It's the morning after the night before and Enda Kenny has landed in Buncrana after a bumpy plane ride up from Dublin to intercede for his candidate, the personable Senator Joe McHugh, in this mother of a Donegal dogfight. Gerry Moriartyin Buncrana
This is Donegal North East where there are at least five serious contenders, including Senator McHugh, for three seats - all currently held by Fianna Fáil.
Sinn Féin is also seriously in the mix. There is fierce cross-party and internecine rivalry here and also a real chance that McHugh could sucker-punch his opponents by sneaking a seat that was last held by Fine Gael 10 years ago.
Kenny's arrival, surely adrenalin-fuelled after the Bertie battle, is therefore timely. Old black and white posters of Brendan Bowyer, The Mighty Mainliners (possibly even before Big Tom joined), and Brian Coll and the Buckaroos point to the vintage of this Plaza ballroom's heyday.
It's hard to get a decent quote from Enda about his bout with Bertie the night before. For some reason he's playing down the scrap.
"I don't consider it in the context of winners and losers at all. It is an element, a part, of a general election campaign. I was very happy with the debate in that it allowed me and my party to put out some of our views and proposals and the vision that we have for Ireland, the alliance we have for change with the Labour Party, how serious we are and how focused we are . . ."
Did he feel "punch-drunk" after the punishing rounds with the Taoiseach, we ask?
His answer evades the question and is about Fine Gael's tax proposals vis-a-vis Fianna Fáil's tax proposals, the party distinctions on stamp duty, tax bands, etc.
While the devil of the detail is, of course, important there's a sense that he is missing the fact that the million viewers who tuned into RTÉ on Thursday night want a more emotional, sweaty, belligerent, post-fight self-analysis.
After all politics, like boxing, is a bloody, spectator sport.
So, The Irish Timespersists. Did he think Bertie ever had him on the ropes. "As Muhammad Ali used to say, 'Do I look as if I am marked?' " Enda responds.
"Wa-hay!" cheer his relieved supporters. That's more like it, Enda.
And indeed he isn't marked. Smart suit, light blue shirt, yellow, blue-dotted silk tie and not a golden tress out of place.
So, who floated like a butterfly, who stung like a bee? "Well, the people of Ireland are going to give their answer to that next Thursday," he says, reverting to type.
The Fine Gael leader just won't try to be what he isn't. Yet, that's the very point that Michelle McKenna liked about him when Kenny visited her pre-school centre in Buncrana half an hour earlier.
She says she's not particularly political but is "warming" to the former teacher, who has an easy, relaxed way with the children, she says. "He is a gentleman," she adds.
That's it. In boxing terms he's Gentleman Jim Corbett, not the Mayo Mauler, which worked just fine in Buncrana yesterday.