Tyrone management team’s future uncertain according to coach Joe McMahon

He has said joint bosses Brian Dooher and Feargal Logan will take time to reflect before making any firm decisions on the 2025 season, while the backroom personnel will also give deep consideration to their positions.

UNCERTAIN: Tyrone joint-managers Brian Dooher, right, and Feargal Logan during the Allianz Football League Division 1 match between Tyrone and Roscommon at O’Neills Healy Park in Omagh, Tyrone. Photo by Ben McShane/Sportsfile

The future for Tyrone’s management team is uncertain following last month’s shock exit from this year’s All-Ireland Championship, according to coach Joe McMahon.

He said joint bosses Brian Dooher and Feargal Logan will take time to reflect before making any firm decisions on the 2025 season, while the backroom personnel will also give deep consideration to their positions.

Logan and Dooher still have two years to run on their second three-year term with the Red Hands.

After winning an All-Ireland title at the first attempt in 2021, their team has struggled over the past three seasons, exiting the current series in a Healy Park upset as Roscommon triumphed in the preliminary quarter-final.

“Things are still a bit raw in the sense of the defeat, and Brian and Feargal and everybody involved will use this time to think and reflect and see where they go next. Time will tell on that one,” said McMahon.

Along with Collie Holmes, both All-Ireland winners as players and coaches, the pair have been involved in the set-up for the past four years.

McMahon feels that any decision on the way forward will be made collectively rather than individually.

“I’ll use this time to see where I’m at, and I think it will be a group decision.

“I was chatting to my da last week, and I was trying to add up, and I think it’s in around 24 years since I have had a free summer from football, between playing and coaching.

“I’ll enjoy this time and spend it with the family, and thereafter decide what the future holds.” The core of the current team, made up largely of the 2015 All-Ireland U21 winning side, is now moving beyond the 30-year mark, while a handful of key players – Mattie Donnelly, Peter Harte and Niall Morgan – will be in their mid-thirties by next season. Morgan has confirmed he will be returning in 2025.

McMahon senses an inevitable period of transition for the Red Hands, which has already started, and was accelerated this year with the introduction of a number of young players due to an injury crisis.

“I think the reality is there. There has been a big turnover of players.

“In the aftermath of 2021, players had left for a variety of reasons, but the show goes on, and boys have come in and taken the opportunity.

“And other fellows are there, are still young, and will get their chance in due course.” Retirements are another consideration, a changing of the guard with could herald the departure of one or two iconic Red Hand stars.

“Possibly. That’s’ a decision for those men involved, and whoever it might be, they owe Tyrone nothing.

“In the aftermath of any defeat, there’s a lot of emotions, and it’s a time now to reflect and see how things went for them this year as individuals and as a group.

“But foremost in all of those decisions has to be themselves and their families, and I’m sure, whatever decisions they come to, it will be for the right reasons.

“Definitely the players that are there and have had the experience and have played at the top level for so long have worn the jersey and taken it to the next level, and it’s up to the younger generation of lads now to come in and push in on.

“I’m not speculating at this stage, but whatever the outcome is, it will be for themselves and their families to decide.” Whatever the future holds for Tyrone, McMahon is confident that it will be a bright one which will see the county reclaim its place as a major force.

“There’s plenty of talented players. They have shown that at under-age, and coming up through there’s definitely a lot of quality there.

“It’s about piecing that together and getting it right on the big days, and moving forward, hopefully, whatever the future is for Tyrone, whether it is the current management team or whoever it might be, whatever is decided, I think there’s enough quality there to certainly as a lot of questions and push on for All-Irelands.”