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Mayo coach Mickey Moran has been accused of being too emotionally involved — but he is never reluctant to admit he loves his players to death. Jim O’Sullivan reports.

THEY’RE the best-known double act in Gaelic football management since the two Brians (Canavan and McAlinden) brought Armagh close to the summit in the late 1990’s.

Mickey Moran’s CV is impressive — a successful player before coaching the Derry team which won the county’s only All-Ireland title in 1993 against Cork.

Later, he gained distinction for his football drills while working with Colm O’Rourke and John O’Keeffe in the International Rules Series before he launched back into inter-county management, first with Sligo, next Donegal, then a return to Derry and finally Mayo in late 2005.

A retired teacher, he’s a very personable individual, known for becoming emotionally involved with his teams. However, he says he was criticised in the past for being “too calm, for holding on and holding on, for not being decisive enough.” Now, he sees himself as being more proactive. “Between the three of us and the stats man, you just have to take that decision and go for it,” he says.

Morrison, from Armagh, is a more brash individual, never short of a comment, sometimes controversial — for instance when he criticised Galway’s style of play after they had beaten Mayo in the League semi-final.

The mutual respect is self-evident after spells together in Donegal and Derry.

“I had known John from a coaching course we both attended. I went down to see him coach a team and asked him into Donegal just to do a wee session pre-Christmas, never thinking I would ask him to join me,” he said. “But I threw it at him, and he jumped at it.!”

Moran’s philosophy in relation to competition is quite simple. All that he looks for is that you take out on to the pitch what you do in training. And that you perform under pressure.

“Nobody knows until the ball is thrown in how things are going to pan out with injuries or if you have a man sent off — all these things that are out of your control. You hope that nerves don’t play a part and that lads go out calm, cool but controlled, focused and ready for battle.”

Moran is also a great believer in flexibility, believing that the strait-jacket approach adopted in the past stunted the development of talent — in the case of a player who may have spent all his career at full-back but might have made a great centre-forward. He recognises that this is an inherent feature of the Kerry team.

He pointed to the Ó Sé brothers (Marc and Tomás) going down the field against Armagh and “tapping over points like corner-forwards”. And, of course he talked about Kieran Donaghy. “He’s a midfielder but a tremendous full-forward. He “slipped” Francie Bellew who is a damn good full-back.

“The way players are coached and trained in the modern game, you have to be versatile. There are certain fellows in the pitch who remain in the same positions, but for nearly every position you have to be able to adapt. If you find yourself in the forward line, then you’re a forward. That’s the beauty of the game at the minute. And that’s the challenge for coaches.”

In relation to the challenge which Donaghy poses, Moran says that all they can do is to try and anticipate how Kerry will plan their game in terms of the players Jack O’Connor has at his disposal.

“To me, it could be a balance of high ball in to Kieran and the cross-field, diagonal ball to the two corner men. We’re trying to meet any eventuality that might happen.

“At the end of the day, our training sessions are not about stopping Kerry. You’ve got to believe in yourself and you have got to have a faith in your own principles on how it should be done. You’re not going to have an All-Ireland handed to you.”

Moran has spoken of the squad in terms of “a family”. He makes the comparison between religion (“it’s not about buildings”) and football in the context of both of them being “all about people”. It prompted a view I can’t ever remember being articulated by a team manager in my experience.

“I don’t care how cold-hearted somebody makes himself out to be, you cannot work with 30 youngsters and not have affection for them. You love them to pieces and (you would) do anything for them.”

Looking at the bigger picture, Moran makes it clear that he’s not concerned by Mayo’s modern history.

“We can only control what we can control. That’s the beauty of it. In Mayo there are chat shows and there are papers, and that’s great for elderly people. It makes their day and it keeps the thing going, but that’s another side of it. All we can control is what we do with the players and that’s the most important thing for us. That’s what we are focused on.

“And, to be fair to the players, an hour after the Dublin match they had a meeting to get back down to earth. Because they know Kerry.”