AFTER Brian McIver was harshly treated at the end of 2007, Donegal were once again on the lookout for a new manager. When things like that are being sorted I tend to stay out of it and just wait to see what happens.

If I recall correctly, there was a bit of confusion and controversy over that appointment at that time. John Joe Doherty went for the job along with a few others and there were some questions about how the interview process went, but when all was said and done John Joe was appointed.

John Joe had a fantastic career with Donegal and he was part of the first Donegal team to win Sam back in 1992. I had known John Joe as I would have played against him with the club a lot as he was still playing away for his club Glen when I started with Gaoth Dobhair. He would have been friendly enough with my brother as he has played a bit with him.

From the off I got on extremely well with John Joe. He had this type of no-nonsense, no bullshit approach and I liked that. I think John Joe is the only Donegal manager that I never had any sort of confrontation with, and that is saying something!

Instead of being on the receiving end I, for once, was the peace-maker, speaking up for a few lads who stepped over the line once or twice.

I explained last week about the levels and professionalism that Brian McIver brought to this county. Well the problem is that players want to continue with that sort of thing so it was always going to be extremely difficult for any manger to come in and implement his own style of training or coaching.

John Joe’s approach was a straight-forward one, you got as fit as you could and you played the game fair and square. There was no place to hide, it was man-on-man and kill or be killed.

For John Joe it was a simple game and there was no need to complicate things. When I look back now with the experience of being in a lot of dressing rooms and coming across every type of character imaginable, I have a lot of sympathy for John Joe.

GAA had gone from a man-on-man approach and you being responsible for your own patch to a game where you would now be moved about to match up with players that suited your game. I have found that when things go wrong for players, we tend to look for someone else to blame before we look at ourselves and perhaps that was the case with John Joe.

In 2009 Antrim beat us at home to knock us out of the Ulster Championship and that was a real low point for that squad and a lot of questions were being asked. We managed to get things together and go on a bit of a run through the Qualifiers until Cork beat us in the All Ireland quarter-final in Croke Park.

After that season players used the excuse that we didn’t have a good enough set-up to be competing at the top. John Joe took all of this on board and he tried to rectify things and get everyone pulling the right way.

In fairness to John Joe, he pulled in a lot of good people and highly regarded sports minds, the likes of Des Jennings, but it just never worked. A few big players had their toys out and more or less downed tools.

At the time Jim McGuiness was coaching the u-21s so a lot of the stories of what they were doing on the training pitch made its way back to our camp and a few of our players were envious.

I was captain that year so naturally I was doing all I could to get the best out of everyone. The lads would raise points and it would be up to me to bring it to John Joe. John Joe was always open to ideas as all he wanted was for Donegal to do as best as they could. Players can sense when things are just not going well though and although we tried our best to get things going in 2010 it was proving difficult. When one or two people pull in the opposite direction then you are always fighting a losing battle. I do think as players we took the easy way out that year by laying all of the blame at the management’s doorstep before looking at ourselves.

Before the championship I tried to give it one last lift and called Jim McGuinness to see if he would be interested in coming in with John Joe to give a hand on the training pitch. The lads had heard how good Jim’s training sessions were and we felt that if we could get him in it would help steady the ship. Jim, in fairness to him, said that he would eventually come in but he would have to be in full charge when that happened.

Down beat us in the Ulster Championship before Armagh humiliated us in the Qualifiers in Crossmaglen. After that game I announced my retirement from inter-county football.

Most of you will know what happens next in relation to my next manager and the book, etc. I will discuss this next week but I’d like to go on record by saying that the only thing I regret abut that book is how John Joe Doherty was portrayed.

John Joe was a great Donegal man and he gave his absolute best all of the time. He just took a job at the wrong time because Donegal players now wanted the type of coaching set-ups that Brian McIver brought and the problem was that we in Donegal had no coaches at that level yet who could have helped John Joe out.

If John Joe was manager nowadays he would have the S&C people around him, he would have the qualified coaches taking the sessions, he would have all the medical and nutritional experts to ensure that the team was going in the right direction. Football is very different now and John Joe, with his personality and passion, could have benefited greatly from all of this.

Now serious questions were being asked of this team both as players and as people so a lot needed to change. Join me next week to find out how that happened.

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