The facility to instil belief the is key trait for GAA's most inspiring managers

29 Apr 2026, 05:45 by Declan Bogue · The42

Declan Bogue

“WE PROBABLY FELT last year we came with more of a frustration game to Donegal and trying to bring them down the straight. The plan today was to get up and get at it nice and early, really test them – and express ourselves,” said Conor Laverty in the wake of the Letterkenny .

“The word we’ve used all week is ‘belief’.’

Down came within six points of Donegal in the Ulster semi-final last year.

On Sunday, they turned last year’s scoring tally of 0-16 into 3-21.

After going in at half-time a point up, manager Conor Laverty had one question for his players: “Do you fully believe me now? Do you fully believe what this management team believe?

“And you could see it bouncing in their eyes. You could see that they were ready.”

Belief is the magic ingredient that has set this championship alight. The shocks have been thrilling and more plentiful than usual, aided somewhat by the altered rules of Gaelic football that reward adventure.

In a squeezed season, it became an article of faith that league form was everything with such little preparation time for championship.

The results have upset that consensus.

Westmeath, with losses to Laois, Down and Wexford, were left in Division 3, and yet overcame Division 2 champions Meath.

Leitrim finished second bottom in Division 4, and beat Sligo who finished mid-table in Division 3.

Roscommon and Mayo were two sides meeting on an equal footing, but Mayo’s 4-26 to 2-11 win over the Rossies in the final round of the league proved worthless as Roscommon achieved a 31-point turnaround to knock Mayo out of Connacht.

Even the performances elsewhere has been encouraging, Wicklow were just two points shy of Dublin with a host of two-pointer chances left unconverted, while Leitrim ran Galway to five points last weekend.

History is littered with managers who come into a county at a low ebb and transform how they think about themselves. What they have in common is unshakeable confidence and the means to transmit the message.

Having the charisma to bring people along is essential. Pushing players hard in training is a non-negotiable.

And players can instantly sniff out the bullshitters. They recognise when a manager is going through the motions.

That’s why all around the Westmeath panel are buzzing off Mark McHugh’s influence. Sitting in Cusack Park beyond midnight on the Thursday night before they met Meath, they put that time into it so that nobody was in doubt about their role.

There’s nothing wrong with a little madness thrown in too. With Clare hurlers, Ger Loughnane should have had all belief knocked out of him as a player. And yet he put his players through the wringer physically, in order to convince them that no team could live with their appetite for hardship.

The 1995 Clare management team of Mike McNamara, Tony Considine and Ger Loughnane. Tom Honan / INPHOTom Honan / INPHO / INPHO

He also backed that up with public comments, the most famous being a brief half-time interview in the 1995 All-Ireland hurling final against Offaly when he finished by saying, “We’re going to win it”.

In charge of Kerry, Kildare, Laois and Wicklow, Mick O’Dwyer proved himself a master of language and how to frame it.

When players were carrying weight after the excesses of the off-season, he told them they had gotten ‘fierce strong,’ rather than shame them.

In training, he would never call a player out for not tracking a run, but rather praise the runner for having made the effort.

Pat Spillane said recently in all the time he had under Micko, he never fell out with him once.

John O’Mahony achieved wonders with Galway, ending a 32-year wait for Sam in 1998, adding another in 2001. But that doesn’t go anyway towards explaining how he got the most remote county, Leitrim, to become a proper force in the game and win a Connacht title in 1994.

Others arrive in projects that are almost fully-formed and tip them over the edge, such as Joe Kernan with Armagh, and Mickey Harte in Tyrone, both of whom won All-Irelands in their first year in charge.

The mistake you can easily make is believing that all these managers command complete respect instantly. They have to show as well as tell.

The Donegal All-Ireland winning midfielder Rory Kavanagh writes in his autobiography, ‘Winning’ about an early meeting with Jim McGuinness in the autumn of 2010.

McGuinness has a black folder between them full of notes on how he wants Donegal to play. He wants Kavanagh in the gym five mornings of the week. He wants Kavanagh to eat six meals a day.

Kavanagh was in listening mode, but he still remembered McGuinness as a player with a fondness of a good time, known as ‘Jimmy Tunes’.

“But I wondered, was he credible? Was he believable?” wrote Kavanagh.

“Jimmy Tunes?

“Jim McGuinness?

“The choice was mine, but after an hour and a half I was still not certain that I was prepared to give him all that he was asking from me.”

McGuinness’ impact was immediate, winning Ulster in year one and Sam Maguire in his second year.

Others take longer. Kieran McGeeney had been in intercounty management since he took the Kildare job for 2008, and he was with Armagh first as a selector in 2014 before taking over as manager a year later.

In all that time, he suffered some heavy defeats that outsiders felt he simply couldn’t survive, but his talent was to keep the nucleus of a team together, believing, suffering the setbacks and coming back for more until they won their All-Ireland in 2024.

The motivational tools of these men can be as inventive as they are impressive.

Kernan was undoubtedly a master of the art form, his half-time team talk for the 2002 final going down in history, as well as the letters received by the panel that morning from Muhammad Ali wishing his Armagh brothers good luck.

Joe Kernan. Donall Farmer / INPHODonall Farmer / INPHO / INPHO

A year later, much was being made of Armagh’s physical advantages over Tyrone for the decider.