Tommy Lyons: ‘These are cycles and it’s just a wonderful cycle at the minute’

Tommy Lyons’ time as Dublin manager couldn’t be more removed from Jim Gavin’s tenure. But the Mayo native is in a good place to comment on the brilliance of a man he introduced to inter-county management.

“Embrace the hype” was the order from Tommy Lyons to his players in 2002.

Indulge in the expectation you have created. Luxuriate in the excitement. If Dessie Farrell felt Lyons was “someone who inhabits a parallel universe”, Jim Gavin, a member of the panel at the time, must have been tearing his hair out.