Midway through the 2023 championship, writing in his Irish Times column, Jim McGuinness considered Galway’s trajectory under Pádraic Joyce.

At the outset of that season, McGuinness had earmarked the Tribesmen as his dark horse to lift Sam Maguire.

“There is almost two phases to the team (under Joyce) – pre-Covid Galway and post-Covid Galway,” wrote McGuinness. “Pre-Covid Galway really shook the game up for a short period, there was a return to a very traditional, dynamic, attacking style.

“Then Covid hit and the Tribesmen struggled initially when games returned. During that period, I think an element of pragmatism came through the door for the Galway management and they seemed to fall in line with the game’s dominant trends.”

Galway didn’t win the All-Ireland that year. Or the year after. Then, somewhat surprisingly, Joyce last week announced he was stepping down as manager. Sam had proved unattainable.

A couple of months after his analysis of Galway, McGuinness hopped off the critics’ couch and took to the sideline again as Donegal manager.

In the three years since, he has led the team to two Ulster titles, adding to the three Donegal claimed in his first term. There was also an All-Ireland final appearance in 2025.

Donegal have won a total of 12 Ulster titles. They have only ever appeared in four All-Ireland senior football finals. All things considered, the last three years have hardly been a barren land of desolation.

And yet, if you spent any time in the hills this summer, there was no avoiding conversations with locals expressing the opinion their footballers had underdelivered over the past 12 months.

You could be forgiven for judging such convictions as having notions, but in reality it’s simply the McGuinness factor. With McGuinness at the helm, expectation levels are different. The bar is higher, because he pushed it there during his first stint.

But that devotion has been tested recently because of several high-profile vapid performances – most notably the All-Ireland final against Kerry in 2025 and defeats to Down and Cork in this year’s championship.

They were all, well, so un-McGuinness like.

And yet, in the middle of all those, Donegal delivered a quite exceptional display to dismantle Kerry by 13 points in the National League final. It felt for all the world like a statement performance. They had cracked the Kerry code.

And then Donegal’s season kind of fell off a cliff.

The Down non-performance was explained away by some as a canny ruse, with Donegal intentionally choosing to plot a course that would see them avoid the claustrophobic cauldron of the Ulster SFC and instead allow them focus totally on the All-Ireland.

But if that was the plan, and by all accounts it was not, then it came undone pretty quickly. A trip to Killarney in May was a game neither county wanted. And the fallout from that ill-tempered contest certainly didn’t help Donegal.

A few weeks later, Cork travelled to Ballybofey for what would prove to be a dog of a game. It was all lateral football and low energy – the spectacle of a league game playing out bang in the middle of the championship. And for the second time in seven weeks, Donegal hadn’t turned up. Fool me once, and all that.

Dublin were no world beaters this season, but Donegal couldn’t deal with Ger Brennan’s side either.

The most basic explanation, but perhaps also the truest, is that Donegal simply timed their run wrong this year. They might have laid down a marker against Kerry twice – but the Kingdom were still playing football a month after Donegal had packed up their tent for the season. Somewhere along the way, there had been a systems malfunction.

Such a rudimentary assessment might not hold much truck with the Donegal management, but it remains the case that their best performance of the year was produced on March 29th in the league final.

Confirmation late on Monday night that McGuinness was returning for 2027 came as little surprise. Nobody in Donegal was looking for a change.

But the make-up of his backroom team for next year will be interesting. Antóin McFadden, his brother-in-law, has stepped down as head of performance.

It indicates they will have a new specialist on the strength and conditioning side of the house. And will McGuinness freshen up his management team in terms of introducing a new selector or coach?

In the aftermath of Donegal’s opening game of the league this year, McGuinness was questioned about the previous summer’s All-Ireland final and, in particular, the freedom Paudie Clifford was afforded.

“I only take counsel from people that have been there and done that,” replied McGuinness. “If it’s an All-Ireland winning manager or a top coach, I’ll listen to them and listen to what they have to say but I don’t listen to anyone outside of that because it doesn’t make sense.”

Given next season will be his fourth of this spell, there probably would be something to gain from adding a fresh voice to the management team.

Will Michael Murphy, Ryan McHugh and Hugh McFadden all go back to the well again next year? A lot of miles in the legs, no doubt. But important leaders, all.

Shaun Patton’s season was wrecked by injury so the All-Star nominated goalkeeper should be back next year to contest the number one spot with Gavin Mulreany.

Shea Malone had an impressive breakout season in 2026 and he has been lighting it up with Naomh Conaill in the club championship. Max Campbell also looks like a real prospect while there are high hopes for Seanán and Turlough Carr to make the step up.

And ultimately McGuinness would not be returning if he didn’t see the potential for a big year in 2027.

Joyce had publicly declared his goal as Galway manager was to win Sam Maguire.

McGuinness doesn’t need to say it. Second time around, it has always been about the All-Ireland – but Joyce’s exit highlights that wanting something and achieving it reside in very different postcodes.

McGuinness was both a dreamer and a pragmatist in the manner he delivered Donegal’s 2012 All-Ireland triumph. None of that has changed. Lessons will have been learned.

Perhaps we shouldn’t expect them to be pulling up many trees in next year’s National League.