GERARD O’Kane has lauded the impact of Damian Barton following Derry's journey deep into the All-Ireland Qualifiers.
Barton was the toast of the county after guiding the team to Round Four of the All-Ireland Qualifiers last weekend.
Wins over Louth, Meath and Cavan have went some way to banishing the bitter memory of their heavy loss to Tyrone in the Ulster Championship two months ago.
O’Kane, who has had a watching brief due to a couple of injuries this season, has praised Barton for his common sense approach and man-management skills.
“Obviously, Damian’s a past-player himself so he knows what makes players tick,” said O’Kane.
“And I don’t mean this in a bad way but he’s been around enough teams to know every type of character. If you work with just the one team for 10 or 12 years you might become institutionalised.
“Damian’s worked with seven or eight teams over a longer period and he’s probably encountered every sort of character he’s ever going to meet, so there’s not a situation he hasn’t dealt with before in his managerial career which I think has helped him coming into the Derry job.”
For the first time in his career, O’Kane stepped out of the inter-county limelight last season only to return to the fold a month before the Tyrone clash.
However, a hand injury and a badly torn hamstring has kept him on the sidelines for the vast majority of the year - but he was named in the 26-man squad that squeezed past Cavan last weekend.
The 31-year-old admitted he probably wouldn’t be part of the Derry set-up this year if he was prevented from playing for his club, now playing intermediate football.
“Damian’s been good to me that way because I’m 31 now,” O’Kane explained.
“Last year, I remember reading about Dermot Carlin pulling out of the Tyrone squad around Championship time because he was sitting on the bench with Tyrone and wasn’t playing for his club. He wasn’t playing football.
“I don’t know how many League games Glenullin have had but Damian has encouraged me to get game-time.
“He would say: ‘Go and get a half of football’, because he realised I was coming back from injury and I needed to get match-fit.”
He added: “Last year I took a bit of time out of my own accord because I’d 12 years of it and last summer was the first time I hadn’t played Championship football for Derry.
“I can’t say I was that annoyed about it. I went on holiday, I did my own thing and whenever you’re away, yes, you miss it, but you realise the world still goes on too.”
Derry are just 70 minutes away from an All-Ireland quarter-final berth as they prepare to face beaten Munster finalists and dark horses Tipperary at Kingspan Breffni Park on Saturday.
Asked what he likes most about this resurgent Derry side, O’Kane said: “Their age profile. You take Mark Lynch out of the equation, who is 30, and obviously I haven’t played any games – I’m 31 – the next boy down is 26 or 27.
“And most of the rest are 21 or 22 years of age.
“The bench has been good for us as well. The management do use their six subs every day. Because the game opens up a bit near the end, the boys are playing as if there are only 10 minutes gone, not 10 minutes to go.
“And those boys that Damian brought in had that wee bit of power in the legs and that bit of speed to exploit the space. The bench has been very, very positive.”
Among others, subs Niall Toner and Niall Loughlin gave Derry the required impetus against Cavan last weekend as they out-scored their hosts 0-8 to 0-3 in the last 10 minutes.
“Derry beat Cavan back in February [in Division Two]. Cavan kicked on from that but I knew Derry were carrying momentum into that game and I fancied us to beat them last weekend.
“But the Louth game in general was when things started to turn for us. Derry weren’t overly impressive but once they got ahead of Louth in the second half they were fit to hold them in the same way a boxer would be fit to jab an opponent, keeping them at arm’s length.
“If Louth got one point, Derry went down the field and got two. When we were fit to do that to a team it showed we had a wee bit of quality in our ranks.”
