THERE ARE A are a certain number of non-negotiables in serious inter-county set-ups.
The base of the pyramid has to be rock-solid. Your main coaches have to be up to scratch. The strength and conditioning work must be serious quality.
Tactical appreciation is a given. Logistics; booking the buses and hotels, making sure the right food arrives at the right time ahead of games, all of that needs boxed off smartly.
Facilities is a huge element.
Training kit, boots, gym access, post-training food and hydration – it might feel like you are heading down the sliding scale of importance here, but players can be hyper-sensitive to these things.
Getting it right is an enormous task, layering one Jenga block on top of another, fearing for the gust of wind that might undo it all.
But none of it matters a fraction, if the players do not believe in the management. Which is how it looks in Derry right now. Do the Derry players believe in Mickey Harte?
It was a first for Derry and a first for Harte that they should go on a warm-weather training camp. The week in Portugal was meant to be the springboard to an All-Ireland title.
That camp represents something of a turning point, after a well-deserved week off following the league final win.
On the last few days, the players were joined by their partners. Why mention that?
It’s possible Derry might have had an entirely rewarding experience. But all the while, Donegal were sharpening their knives. In the end-up, Derry looked sated that Saturday night they met. They had grown to be prosperous. The fact that the damage was so self-inflicted, with no means of changing course, made them look ponderous and indulgent.
So, on we go to Galway, last Saturday. The week after the Donegal defeat, Padraig McGrogan ruptured his cruciate.
Further losses of Conor Doherty and Eoin McEvoy meant their half-back line was decimated for last weekend. Brendan Rogers has been carrying an injury but was handed the job of shoring up the line.
And after 22 minutes, Gareth McKinless stamped down the back of Damian Comer’s ankle, deservedly getting a red card.
Big moment in Pearse Stadium as Gareth McKinless gets sent off.@AIB_GAA #TheToughest pic.twitter.com/z5RwRh9XHB
— GAAGO (@GAAGO) May 18, 2024
With McGrogan, Doherty, McEvoy injured, and now McKinless out with a suspension, Derry are missing four of their six defenders. Niall Loughlin, another nailed-on starter over the last few years who featured prominently throughout the league, has had a groin operation.
All of a sudden, Harte is no longer managing a team. He’s managing a situation.
For a county that have made seven of the last nine minor finals, the panel depth is so thin to be almost gauze-like. It was one of the issues that Harte and Devlin tackled head on.
In the early stages of the year he gave gametime to no fewer than 40 players. Diarmuid Baker became a regular starter and Donncha Gilmore became the regular first sub.
Lachlan Murray grew in confidence and Niall Loughlin had a more prominent role in general play. They shunted Eoin McEvoy to centre-back because of Gareth McKinless’ absence.
All that tinkering, and yet still delivering week-in, week-out.
Which is fine, right up to the point that you wonder why it has to be eyeballs-out from January?
Derry won the league and, nice and all as it was for the players, and another piece of national silverware – but can you recall what happened to the league winners in 2023?
Let me remind you: Mayo were beaten a week later at Castlebar in the Connacht quarter-final against Roscommon.
It all added up to the time-honoured wisdom that leagues are for playing in, but not winning.
When he was in charge, Harte’s predecessor Rory Gallagher made a point of not carrying a huge panel.
Unlike say, Donegal who currently operate off a panel of around 40, Derry barely were into 30 players. And even at that, Gallagher would occasionally lop a player off the panel, such as Anton Tohill at the start of 2023.
But under Gallagher, nobody left the Derry panel, either. That was because they believed – believed in the team, in the management, and that they could win an All-Ireland.
Did he get lucky with injuries? Well, at the end of the 2023, the lead strength and conditioning coach, Peter Hughes, was scooped up by New Zealand Rugby to do the same job for their Sevens team. Losing Hughes and his knowledge was a disaster.
Given Gallagher’s allegations of domestic abuse, it wasn’t feasible for him continuing as Derry manager.
He had built Derry from the ground up and formed seriously close ties with the players.
With Gallagher no longer an option, the Derry board did what they could by approaching those that had won All-Ireland titles. The wheel eventually came round to Harte.
But while Gallagher took steps such as visiting every player at home to examine their home gym set ups, Harte is much more standoffish.
When it comes to coaching and gameplans, that’s Gavin Devlin’s responsibility. As the years have gone on, Harte has become more remote.
One of Gallagher’s strengths was his obsession with tactics.
“I have never been involved in a Derry team that is as technically attuned,” said Chrissy McKaigue in May 2022.
Later that month, after winning their first Ulster title in 24 years, Shane McGuigan said: “The man lives and breathes football. You have heard it all before but it is hard to put into words how much he cares about the players and about the team.”
Harte simply doesn’t live under your fingernails like that. It was clear that by the end of his time with Tyrone, some players were appreciative, but vocal in the sense that it was time to move on.
At Louth, their players praised Devlin for his training ground smarts, and the management for changing the culture. Sprucing up their Darver training centre and planting trees to break the wind, that sort of thing.
They enjoyed some success. There were significant tactical awakenings on the training field. But there was a ceiling to it all.
Going to Derry was all about winning an All-Ireland title.
So this is where he finds himself. A home game against Armagh before facing Westmeath in a neutral venue.
If every motivational gambit and tactic was deployed before the Galway game only for a second successive implosion, then it all sounds a bit hollow this Tuesday ahead of training.
Essentially, this Derry panel have two games to save themselves. Conceivably, they could beat Westmeath at a neutral venue in the last round and still go through if Galway and Armagh also beat Westmeath.
But losing three consecutive championship games is not the form of a contender.
Again, we ask: Do the Derry players believe in Mickey Harte?
