STRANGE times. Rudy Guiliani claims he is the victim of erection fraud, Donald Trump warns Americans that if the Democrats get elected they will be forced to live in houses “with tiny little windows you can barely see out of” and the Son of God is trying his hand at senior county football.

Jimmy McGuinness scarred Mickey Harte permanently. Those annual, grinding defeats to Donegal exorcised attacking football from Mickey’s psyche and he hasn’t recovered. Playing one 5’6” forward on his own against the Dublin defence in the 2017 semi-final summed this up.

A friend of mine says “The only way to watch Tyrone is via Tyrone Tribulations on Twitter.” Before the throw-in at the recent league game between Tyrone and Donegal, Tribulations tweeted “ Sludden in for Harte. Only the 13 defenders starting now.” As it turned out, they took the field with only 12 defenders, which by Mickey’s standards is a high-risk strategy.

They duly laboured to a demoralising defeat, spared from humiliation only by a very fortunate penalty and a solo goal from the extraordinary Conor McKenna, who first came to fame jumping into wheelie bins from a standing start.

Against Mayo last weekend, Mickey surprised everyone by giving the Son of God a start. Or as @Tyrone Tribulations calls him, “Pascal’s nephew.” As he put it on his Twitter feed “Darragh Canavan starts. Darragh is the nephew of Pascal.”

Tyrone went nine points up, largely courtesy of two superb goals that came out of the blue. The first by McKenna, who looks more or less unmarkable.

The second, a superb, raking 40-metre pass from McKenna to the Son of God, who proceeded to do an uncannily perfect impression of God. Or as Tribulations put it “great goal by Pascal’s nephew.”

The problem was that these were isolated moments, created by two highly skilled forwards with virtually no support. Put another way, it was not part of an attacking pattern.

In the second half, it was all Mayo. Tribulations again: “Tyrone yet to score this half. Think they have spotted Declan Bonner in the stand. Pretending to play shite now. Another Mayo point.”

Then, just as it seemed certain Mayo would overhaul them, the usually reliable David Clarke took a disastrous short kick-out and Wheelie bin man punished him severely, flicking the ball up without stooping, even having time to slip to the ground and get back up again before driving it expertly to the net via the near post. Another isolated event.

For the remainder of the game it was all Mayo. Pascal’s nephew was taken off, having been chronically underused, and Tyrone almost defended themselves to another defeat, hanging on by a single point as Mayo came forward in droves. Tribulations captured the tension of a last minute free for Mayo as follows “Only one in it. Fermanagh ref moves the ball forward due to a long running land disagreement with the Donnellys.”

Tyrone clearly have the players. The problem is that the manager does not trust them. Which is why the emphasis is always on defence.

Tyrone’s six forwards, in no particular order, should be Lee Brennan, Paul Donaghy, Son of God, Mattie Donnelly, Conor McKenna and Darren McCurry. With these expert attackers on the field Tyrone would be in business.

Kerry or Dublin do not play defenders in the forward line. This is because they understand that it is only possible to win big if you trust your forwards and have a system that emphasises attack. Croke Park is not a place for needless conservatism.

This fear of picking the best forwards and creating a game-plan to assist them makes it impossible for Tyrone to get into a rhythm. Eddie Brennan always says his great Kilkenny team was able to get on a roll and stay on it because Cody fully trusted them. The manager empowered them to attack. It was what was expected of them so when the opportunity arose, they did so without fear.

This is what is often described as going for the jugular. The inability to do this is why Tyrone lost to Kerry in the semi-final last year. They built a winning lead that day, but instead of putting Kerry away, they were overcome with fear.

Unable to go on a roll, they left it to Kerry to go for the jugular, an invitation Kerry teams do not decline. Nothing has changed for Tyrone, save for the fact that Conor McKenna has come home in time to save them from relegation.

When we learned before throw-in last weekend that Michael Murphy was not even in the squad, we knew Donegal had only come to fulfil the fixture.

Rory Kavanagh told me a story once about Murphy. In the early days of the McGuinness experiment, Paddy McGrath had an opportunity to take the young titan out in training and took it, hitting him hard and late and putting him down. Murphy shook himself, got back to his feet and got on with it. Five minutes later, Murphy poleaxed McGrath, leaving him lying on the ground for several minutes, gasping for breath. Kavanagh said it was the moment he knew they would win an All-Ireland.

Austin Stack’s stadium may have been empty but Covid has some advantages.

It was a relief before throw-in that there was no Scór winner from Tobernascreel butchering the national anthem, a weekly ritual that borders on treason. It is only a matter of time before All-Ireland finals day is spoiled by a lassie from Brockagh giving it up like Beyoncé at the Superbowl.

Without Murphy, and eight other first team players, after a first quarter which Marc O’Sé described on EIR as “a chess match” (translation “this is extremely boring”), Kerry switched from autpilot to manual and for the rest of the half played quite brilliantly, except for their ’keeper who struggled badly on the kick-outs, which was fine for this game but will not do against the Dubs in eight weeks. Donegal’s trajectory has been the opposite of Tyrone’s. Under Bonner they play with excitement and adventure. We saw this in the recent league game between these two. If they had Pascal’s nephew, he would be one of the first names on the team sheet, instead of squeezing in after the defenders have been selected.

In truth, Tyrone – with say God managing – should be beating Donegal with something to spare. In reality, they are relying on Conor McKenna winning the game for them against the run of play, with Neil McGee playing the part of the wheelie bin.