Gaelic Games: The offices of the Leinster Council in Portlaoise were closed yesterday. It wasn't, however, a spontaneous response to Sunday's big win by Mick O'Dwyer's Laois.

"It's been a rough six weeks in the office," according to provincial secretary and happy Laois man Michael Delaney, "and we had decided to give everyone a day off. There were no objections."

Expressing himself as being "as delighted as any Laois man would be" after the match, Delaney put his administrative hat on to allay fears that the council would be at a serious loss because of the departure of major crowd pullers Dublin and Meath.

"No, we budget on a likely figure that is projected on the basis of an average Leinster final, one which isn't necessarily between Dublin, Meath or Kildare. That way if we have a big attendance at the final it's a bonus.

"But I don't think this year's will be too much short of 45,000 to 50,000. There'll be a lot of attention focused on Micko and the two teams he's been involved with."

Whereas everyone in the county was keen to acknowledge that nothing had been won, Sunday was the first evidence that Laois's unprecedented underage success in the mid-1990s was at last bearing fruit at senior level. As was frequently stressed in the dressingroom afterwards, beating Dublin at Croke Park is a rite of passage for most improving teams.

Delaney admitted that it was just as pleasing to see a new county make a breakthrough as to see his county doing well.

"It's given a lift to the whole province. Taking the Laois hat off for a minute, you'd still admire the exciting football they played. It wasn't just sledge-hammering, it was good football.

"The win raises the point that if you put in the work - and Laois have put in tremendous work at underage - you can challenge the likes of Dublin and Meath and, in recent years, Kildare. It's 22 years since the county beat Dublin so it has to be a encouragement to those other counties who are trying to break through."

The cycle of success will now be visible in Laois. Having produced quality players in the teams that won back-to-back minor All-Irelands in 1996 and '97, the consequent success will feed back into the roots of the game.

"Wouldn't you love to be organising summer camps in Laois for the next five weeks?"

Next month's provincial final will be the first between the counties since Laois won the county's most recent title in 1946. The sense of occasion will be heightened by the opposition being neighbouring rivals.

"Kildare and Laois is a big rivalry," says county secretary Niall Handy. "A good few of the players are from that end of the county, Stradbally, St Joseph's, Arles. It will be an extra motivation for them.

"The result has done wonders for the county. After the league final some of the supporters were getting disillusioned at what they saw as another example of a 'nearly team'. Everyone was expecting so much from those minor teams."

The progress that led to underage All-Irelands is all the more remarkable in a county with a population of between just 55,000 and 60,000.

"A process was put in place in the mid-Nineties," said Handy, "and a huge effort went in at juvenile level from Sean Dempsey, who was manager of those minor teams, and it's still there. Ross Munnelly is an example of a player who has come through since."

Handy also acknowledged that the speed of the O'Dwyer revolution had surprised many in the county.

"You would have to be surprised, yeah. Micko came in for a two-year term and we knew that getting things right takes time, so that everything he did this year would be a bonus."

Kilkenny wing back Richie Mullally will miss the Leinster hurling final. One of last year's All-Ireland winning team, Mullally broke his ankle in a club match at the weekend and is expected to be out for six weeks. The blow comes a week after the sudden retirement of county captain Charlie Carter and Brian McEvoy,

Dublin football selector Dave Billings has claimed that RTE television went "overboard" in their criticism of Dublin after the defeat by Laois.

Speaking on Newstalk 106's Off the Ball, Billings singled out the former Meath player and commentator Bernard Flynn, saying: "I don't know if he knows what he's talking about most of the time, but certainly the way he puts over his points he's not making much sense to anybody.

"I think he just has a provincial attitude that's just anti-Dublin in total."