by Declan Rooney

John O'Leary says Stephen Cluxton is the greatest goalkeeper he has ever seen and thinks he can remain as Dublin's No 1 until he turns 40 - providing he stays clear of injuries.

Cluxton will captain Dublin in Sunday's Leinster semi-final against Westmeath and will hope to go one step closer to a 13th Leinster title in his 17th championship season. According to O'Leary the 35-year-old shows no sign of letting his standards drop.

O'Leary was 36 when he called a halt to his non-stop 70-game run as Dublin's championship stopper, but he thinks Cluxton has the ability and fitness to retain the goalkeeper's shirt for another four or five seasons.

"What age is he now, 35? I was 36 when I finished up playing and had been there for 18 years. He is probably not there quite as long," said O'Leary.

"But he has been there quite some time and had been there and done that. For any player who is there that long it boils down to the 'get up out of bed' question. Why bother? It's obviously not a problem for him, he's training away and playing well.

"He can keep going (until 40) if he stays injury free. He's the best I've seen. He has changed the game. The game changed anyway, but he changed with it and brought a new skill factor with it.

"Particularly the kick-out, he is head and shoulders above anyone that's around at the moment and previously.

"There is plenty of goalkeepers around who can stop shots, but he has that extra dimensions that has him way above everybody else in the last few years."

O'Leary made his Dublin championship debut in 1980 and retired following his side's first round loss in the 1997 Leinster championship.

With Cluxton biting at his heels to become first choice it was a natural time for him to end his stint, but he says if he was playing nowadays, the extended summer through the back door might have seen him hang on for another couple of years.

"We had won the All-Ireland in '95 and we had a change in management. Then we were beaten in the Leinster final in '96 and in the first round in '97, for us the whole thing had changed. The team was in a transition period really.

"Maybe losing in the first round made it very easy that year. If we had gone to a Leinster final or an All-Ireland semi-final things might have been different.

"We went from playing an All-Ireland final and Leinster finals to going out in the first round. We were going backwards from a results point of view.

"And there was no back door back then either, which would have given us a few more games. It would be another seven or eight months when we got back into it again. It was a different time.

"I don't get any sense Stephen is near retirement because he's playing in a very successful team. He's a very successful captain and he's playing really well. You'd hope he keeps going for another two or three years. He might hit 40, you'd never know.

"But there is no doubt there is an 18 or 19 year old currently playing in the Dublin underage system who will be at the perfect age whenever he does eventually call it a day.

"Because the goalkeeper position - there has only been three or four of us in a long number of years - you can get in there and play well, there is no reason why a 21 or 22 year old couldn't hold it for another ten years."

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