IT ENDED AS IT began.
Feargal Logan and Brian Dooher did everything they could as players, and then as managers of the U21 team and the senior side.
When it became clear that they couldn’t go on, they did what Mickey Harte did before them; they stepped away with class.
The reasons are obvious. Logan took a stroke before Tyrone’s game against Derry on 4 February.
Eventually, he would make it back to be with the team on matchdays, but by his own admission, his capacity to be engaged in top-end sport has been drastically curtailed.
Dooher carried on. The duo were in the first year of their second three-year term with the county board. 2024 was about the first steps of the rebuild.
Instead, it was a demonstration of how far behind they had fallen. Four defeats in the National League left them just hovering about relegation.
Two of their three wins came against the two relegated sides; Roscommon and Monaghan.
Even a home win over Mayo couldn’t be taken at face value. Kevin McStay’s side had used that Omagh trip as an extended weekend training camp and had trained and did a gym session in Enniskillen the day before.
Losing to Dublin by 21 points on the final day was a gut-check for some fringe players, and they had the traditional post-league departure of a number of panellists.
The Ulster championship ended with an extra-time defeat to Donegal. The round robin brought a seven-point beating from Donegal before wins over Clare and Cork bought them just enough time to be wiped out in front of a small crowd in Omagh by Roscommon.
In the meantime, Dooher had ascended to the role of Chief Veterinary Officer for the Stormont Administration.
It is a rarity that people involved in managing intercounty teams have such responsibility in their working lives. With Logan being a partner in a legal practice across two sites in Omagh and Coalisland, it made for two men with exceptionally busy circumstances.
But what drove both was a love and devotion for Tyrone that bordered, some would say overstepped the mark, on insanity.
Stories of Dooher’s devotion are as plentiful as they are entertaining.
This is a man who chose to walk down the aisle in crutches on his wedding day, as he wouldn’t postpone a close-season operation on his ankle to make it back in time for the start of a league campaign.
And then, there was THAT point in the 2008 All Ireland final against Kerry; a study in determination, drive, skill, strength and sheer belligerence.
Brian Dooher grabbing an All-Ireland by the scruff of the neck
— All-Star Sports (@AllStarSports0) April 24, 2021
⭐️ Name a better point at HQ#GAA #AllStarSports #GetAGrip pic.twitter.com/S7lULkSVWQ
Away on an All-Star trip once, he was pounding a treadmill in a hotel gym once, with a steep gradient and pace. He was already well in when Enda McGinley decided to make his face known in the gym and took the machine beside Dooher, set his settings to match his captain, and off he went.
10 minutes later with lungs burning, he made an excuse that he only came in to do a few weights and hopped off. After a short sauna, shower and change, McGinley was leaving when he glanced into the gym again. There was Dooher, by then in his late 30s. Still running and sweat pouring over the equipment.
Then there was Logan. A midfield mainstay of the mid-90s, he wrecked his ankle in the 1995 All Ireland semi final win over Galway. He practically lived in an oxygen tent in, well, Larne of all places trying to get himself right for the decider.
That they lost that final, and he was long gone by the time 2003 rolled around, left a hole that he couldn’t fill. He managed the U21 side to the 2015 All Ireland title.
But on the day they won the senior All Ireland in 2021, he said he had finally come to a place of contentment with his involvement with Tyrone.
They leave at the right time. All things come to an end.
Now, the succession plan begins.
The name of Malachy O’Rourke has done the rounds in connection with Derry for months now, but if anything was to come of it, you’d imagine it would be done by now.
He didn’t fancy Derry last year when it was on the table for him and it’s difficult to see how things have changed to make it any more attractive.
Many conversations around Tyrone today will come accompanied with the observation that their county maintain a tradition similar to Kerry and Dublin footballers, along with Tipperary, Cork and Kilkenny hurlers, in that they don’t hand over the keys to the kingdom to ‘outside’ managers, thereby ruling out O’Rourke.
However, it’s simply not true. In the latter stages of 1989, they appointed John Donnelly as manager. He was originally from Coa O’Dwyers and spent 12 years playing for Fermanagh. His connection to Tyrone came through playing club football for Trillick when he became the local school principal.
By way of coincidence, he was the man to hand Peter Canavan and Logan their Tyrone debuts.
Going back further than that, and the team that Art McRory took to the 1986 All Ireland final was trained by an Enniskillen man who taught in Omagh, the late Benny Burns.
By this stage, O’Rourke has been in Tyrone much longer than he lived in Fermanagh. He transferred from his native Derrylin O’Connell’s to play and win titles with Errigal Ciaran.
He later managed them to the 2006 Tyrone championship, but left it at that after one season.
If O’Rourke has any ambition left, then Tyrone is the ultimate posting for him. The Garvaghy complex is just six miles from his front door. Living close-by is his long-time collaborator, Ryan Porter.
He is retired after his service with St Joseph’s secondary school in Enniskillen. He has an All Ireland with Glen.
There is a sense that Paddy Tally could be prised away from Kerry to come back to a side he last coached 20 years ago. All in, a pretty fearsome coaching backroom could be assembled fairly handy.
For sure, there are other contenders. And there is no doubt that Paul Devlin, having led Tyrone to two of the last three U20 All Irelands, deserves a good shout.
But O’Rourke is the priority. Everyone knows it.
