John O’Donoghue gave the game away in yet another ungracious farewell speech as he lost his seat in Kerry at the weekend.

‘The Bull’, suffering the same fate as a slew of Fianna Fáilers, spoke from the podium of the “irony” in being defeated in the very hall — a “magnificent” place, naturally — “I helped to build”; a reference to the €5.3m the Killarney sports complex received in Government funding.