ADRIAN McGuckin always prepared his teams with the knowledge that there were two imponderable caveats in Gaelic football: the referee and the weather.
There was, and is, very little preparing for what one, the other or both might do to the best laid plans.
You go out and meet a referee whose decisions go against you or an afternoon with an unseasonal air and suddenly, every plan you made takes up residence in no man’s land.
For Tyrone, it is critical that those two imponderables fall on their side in Croke Park this Sunday.
When Mickey Harte saw David Gough’s name beside the quarter-final fixture against Armagh, his heart would have sunk in his chest.
He would have been hoping that the Meath referee would have been held back a round and given this titanic semi-final instead of a game that Tyrone were always going to win.
Harte has been accused in some quarters of buttering Gough up but it’s simply that his style of refereeing suits the way Tyrone like to play.
They had him in their quarter-final against Mayo last year and on an afternoon where their tackling was off, he punished them the same way he did Galway in the rain-lashed Connacht final earlier this year.
But when Tyrone’s tackling is of the quality and intensity that they brought to the Ulster semi-final against Donegal earlier this year, and when Gough is the man in the middle, you get a remarkable return like eight frees conceded in 70 minutes.
For this assignment, it is David Coldrick that is on the whistle.
On his day, he can be almost as unfussy. Consider, for instance, the contrast in his performance during the first half of Down’s Ulster semi-final win over Monaghan to the whistle-happy display by his half-time replacement Paddy Neilan.
Coldrick is a good referee and in the circumstances, almost as good as Tyrone could have hoped for.
If he has one of his laissez-faire days, it will suit Tyrone. The Dubs are not shy in the physical stakes but they will always win with a fussy referee.
Dean Rock will see to that.
For any opposition, leeway being given in the tackle is key to beating them.
And sometimes that tendency comes from what the skies decide to produce.
Mickey Harte will have his players doing a rain dance at Garvaghey every night this week.
Dublin are not as effective in the rain. Who is, really? But when you’re up against the best attacking team of a generation, you’d always be hoping for an off-day from them.
The 2015 final against Kerry, when it teemed from the heavens all afternoon, they scored 0-12.
And in the rain, referees tend to give that little bit of allowance that Tyrone would be looking for.
Look at last year’s drawn All-Ireland final – heavy rain, 2-9 in total, including two own goals and a single point from play in the first half.
Look at how Mayo were allowed to rip into Dublin that day. Turnover after turnover after turnover.
Counter-attacking opportunities are the lifeblood of this Tyrone team and if they are allowed to strip possession by whatever means and get away with it, they will be in with a hell of a shout.
There is an absence in such conditions of the near-flawlessness that Jim Gavin’s men can sometimes achieve.
Tyrone’s chances are dependent on that refereeing leeway. For instance, in the league meeting with Dublin, Joe McQuillan allowed Ronan McNamee to get very physical with Eoghan O’Gara. The result was complete nullification by the Tyrone full-back.
A number of more questionable frees in the final 20 minutes helped offer the Dubs a route back to salvage a draw, but it was the call to send off Mark Bradley that really swung it that night.
What also helped Tyrone for the first 50 minutes were the conditions. It was a horrible night, the worst kind.
Of course Tyrone’s running game is susceptible to breakdown in those conditions too, but the fact that they train on top of a mountain doesn't do them any harm.
If they don’t keep Dublin beneath 16 or 17 points it will hardly matter how well they attack.
Should we wake up to grey skies and a bad forecast on Sunday, Tyrone's chances of playing in the September showdown will increase dramatically.
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Time to review pricing structures
THERE’S much has been said about the physical and psychological cost to Mayo supporters of enduring their weekly footballing adventures, but not enough about the hit to their pockets.
Like Tyrone in 2005, this may be an exception to the norm in terms of the number of games but across the Championship, it’s cost their fans an average of just under €28 per game to watch their county.
To put that into context, 11 Premier League clubs offer better value than that. And were Stephen Rochford to guide them into the All-Ireland final on Saturday, Mayo fans would be worse off than the supporters of 16 of the money-driven English pyramid’s top clubs, with only Chelsea, Arsenal, Liverpool and Tottenham charging more for their cheapest season ticket.
A €5 increase in ticket prices for this year’s quarter- and semi-finals didn’t appear a major deal in itself but the big issue is how they plan on dealing with the pricing structure for next year’s Super 8s.
There are likely to be ticket packages to cover each qualifying county’s three games at the quarter-final stage but it’s unlikely that the GAA will sell those games for less than its provincial finals.
It’s equally unlikely that we’ll see a reduction in ticket prices in the provinces. With the semi-final prices now raised and the final set at €80 – which is over-the-top – the cost to loyal fans continues to grow.
And while you could certainly lay claim that the Mayo fans have had value-for-money, they’re very much an exception to the rule.
