Harte puts focus on Tyrone’s end game

Finishing powerfully with strength from bench proving critical to Red Hand revival

MICKEY HARTE gave a remarkable insight into his strategy after his Tyrone team advanced to the All-Ireland semi-finals at Donegal’s expense on Sunday when discussing the impact of his bench.

All managers plan carefully for the end game but Harte is the first to acknowledge that he is deliberately tailoring his team for such impact by holding players worthy of a start in reserve.

“There are people who didn’t start the game today who are worthy to be on the team but they are also big enough to play for the team and come in knowing that they’re going to make a difference,” he said.

“If you started them, you wouldn’t be sure that the people that you would be leaving off could come in and make the same impact.

“There are players who are good at that – obviously Kieran McGeary stands out as a really quality player at that particular role.”

Distinguishing between those who can and might not make an impact in these circumstances is quite a balancing act that risks unwanted stereotype in some cases.

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Other counties have tailored players for similar roles, Kevin McManamon has come off the bench more times for Dublin than he has started, Cormac Costello started only his second game for the All-Ireland champions in six seasons on Sunday, having come on as a substitute in 13 others, while Barry John Keane has started just three of the 37 games he has played for Kerry.

The impact of the Tyrone back-up is reflected in the 2-5 they contributed against Donegal, coming after four of their 14 points against Dublin came off the bench two weeks earlier.

But Tyrone’s second goal, in the 11th minute of added time at the end of the second half on Sunday, perhaps best encapsulates their collective contribution with McGeary, Rory Brennan, Declan McClure, Harry Loughran and Conal McCann combining in a move that ran the length of the field before McClure looped around to finish.

As he did so, on his outside was Lee Brennan, the sixth substitute, reaffirming the amount of support runners they had so often in that last quarter.

To have that energy and running so deep in a game is a valuable asset for any team, something Dublin have been working towards over the last six years under Jim Gavin with their ability to replace like-for-like in so many cases.

Such running power has allowed Tyrone to finish all of their games impressively. On Sunday they outscored Donegal by 2-7 to 0-2 from the 53rd minute on, against Dublin they were six points down in the 57 th minute but got it back to two before Dublin pushed out again with a Paul Flynn point.

They were always in control against Roscommon in the opening quarter-final game but were just five ahead in the 48th minute before pulling away to win by 18.

Even in the qualifiers, it was a trend. From 0-10 to 0-5 ahead at