Ahead of the best day of Gaelic Football in what feels like aeons, Tomas O'Se has used his Irish Independent column to shower praise upon Mickey Harte.
It's a brilliant column, so we recommend you read it on the Indo's website.
O'Se reveals how he used to detest Tyrone at the height of their rivalry with Kerry during O'Sé's playing career:
You know when I was playing I used to flat out hate the Tyrone boys. If they were at the All-Stars or some another function, I'd go the other side of the room. I'd duck and I'd dive and I'd dodge them like the plague.
This admittedly childish behaviour, he asserts, helped generate the level of all-out hatred he needed to ascend to the emotional pitch required to go to war with Harte's Tyrone.
Layered among this dislike is a clear - if begrudging - respect for Tyrone, but Ó'Sé is far more clear-cut in his praise for Mickey Harte. Ó'Sé's praise of Harte is similar to the compliments visited upon Alex Ferguson: their success is one thing; the longevity of that success is another fact entirely:
But if you were to ask me right now, I'd love to have played for Mickey Harte. I looked at the video of him coming into the Tyrone dressing room with the Anglo-Celt Cup after the Ulster final.
And the room just erupts one lad turns Mickey's hat backwards like he was a rapper.
I can't imagine how Mickey gets through to his current team of young fellas. They must be so different to the young Tyrone lads he started out with back in the 1990s. But he does. And in that clip their respect for him is absolute but the affection is genuine.
To be still relevant after all this time is amazing. His longevity is incredible, especially considering how much change the game has seen in his period in charge.
This is the video in question:
@TyroneGAALive pic.twitter.com/JN6t1k5tKt
— Joe McMahon (@Bigjoemc) July 17, 2016
Seriously, read the full column, it's a joy.
Even purely for its use of the great phrase "quare animals".
See Also: 'Maybe They Celebrated Too Hard' - Pondering Galway's Baffling Display Last Week
See Also: 'I'm Not Particularly Optimistic' - Matty Forde Talks Modern Leinster Football
