Kelly and Duignan delighted to avail of Harte's vast experience for the betterment of Offaly football

DECLAN Kelly was intrigued from the moment the possibility of Mickey Harte becoming involved with Offaly senior footballers was suggested to him by Offaly GAA chairman Michael Duignan just over a week ago.

The announcement that Kilclonfert man Kelly and Tyrone's fantastically successful long time boss would serve as joint managers on a three year term caught all observers by surprise last week.

Kilclonfert man Kelly had just served one season as manager and a review of the way forward was taking place when he was told that Harte was willing to get involved in Offaly. The nature of Offaly's exit from the Tailteann Cup this year, the defeats by London and Limerick, meant that a debate on management had to take place.

There was a desire by the powers that be to keep Kelly there. He had earned the job after leading Offaly to the All-Ireland U-20 football title in 2020 but the way last year ended up showed that changes were needed.

No one, however, expected something as nuclear as Harte coming to Offaly. Once agreement was obtained that Harte would come, the best solution was to appoint the duo as joint managers and a former Sligo footballer, Luke Bree has since been added as a coach.

The appointment has created plenty of excitement in Offaly but it was still a big decision for Kelly to relinquish full control and enter the uncertain and potentially stormy waters of joint management.

However, he was fascinated from the minute Michael Duignan told him of Mickey Harte's interest and could see the benefits of going down this road.

Kelly, Harte and Michael Duignan met with the local media in O'Connor Park on Sunday and Kelly outlined:

“Michael approached me to tell me that Mickey had enquired about the Offaly set up, and my initial reaction was that this was worth having a chat about. For Offaly and for myself, the bigger thing here is Mickey’s vast experience. For Offaly to progress, what Mickey can bring to the table in terms of what he’s done, I think from an Offaly perspective, it was a no brainer to have the discussion and see where it took us.”

They have talked about and agreed many aspects of what way the joint management will work, the different roles they will take on. There will be inevitable differences of opinion as the preparations start but Kelly is confident that they will work very well together.

“We’re obviously looking at players at the moment so my biggest input at the moment would be the player pool that’s there, giving Mickey guidance about the players that were there this year and the potential lads that are out there. One thing I was very positive about was that Mickey actually knows a lot about the Offaly players and he had a lot of work done. That was something that I found very positive, he knew a lot of the players that he was coming into.

“In relation to the selection of panels and the selection of teams, that’s going to be pretty tight between the two of us and the head coach. It’ll be no different than it was this year. Is there differences, well there will be differences no matter where you are with what selections people want to go with, but there won’t be any major differences.”

Already, Harte and Bree have viewed footage of club championship games while Kelly has been at many of them, in all grades.

“Mickey’s already looked at a lot of the games from this year, Luke (Bree) is looking at a lot of the games from this year as well. Mickey has a good handle on a lot of the lads currently anyway. But in the next number of weeks we’ll start identifying who we’ll want to come in.”

For Michael Duignan, it represents a spectacular coup as he enters the final few months of his five year reign as chairman. He spoke with great passion about Offaly football and the input Harte and Kelly can both have.

“From a county point of view, from the first day we came in ambition is my biggest word, one that I always use. If we don’t believe that we can win All-Ireland's again, then it’s never going to happen. That’s the standard you have to set, that’s what you have to believe in. If we don’t believe it, and if the lads (management) don’t believe it, then the players won’t believe it. We have to create that culture of excellence across the board, and what we try to do is bring in the best people we could. Declan came in for his first year and after that we did a review and we felt that we could make things better, and that’s what this is. As for tags and names, we call them joint managers but what they are is two men who are going to work together for the betterment of Offaly football, along with Luke Bree, who hasn’t the profile of the lads but I believe he is a really excellent young coach who I think is going to add a lot to overall picture.

“I’m very excited about having Mickey, Declan and Luke, three great football men. And on Declan, nobody has done more for Offaly football over the last decade than Declan Kelly. What he’s invested with club and county teams, with all those U-20s, he did create a culture where he strove to bring discipline and good football, which we saw at the U-20 level. I think there’s a great chance for Declan to learn from Mickey and there’s a great chance for Mickey to learn from Declan, because everybody has something to learn every day you get up.

“I believe that whether we see it straight away in results or not, it’s for the betterment of Offaly, our young people and our young players. Mickey said about making better people and that’s something I’ve learned since I came into the role, looking at our development squad players, looking at what it means to them and their families, and the benefit to them as young people; they’re fit, they’re healthy, they’re playing for their county and they love it, and that can only be a good thing for society in general.”