There'd normally have been a handful of Mayo footballers in the papers a week like this;

this week there's only been Alan Dillon and he'd have got a few quid for doing that promotion gig. And Omagh last week; Mayo didn't need to win but their manager has always wanted every team of his to win every game. Raising the expectations of players while quelling those of the public; it was the O'Mahony way in Galway and it's the O'Mahony way in Mayo. Gary Fahey, the man who lifted the Sam Maguire O'Mahony masterminded in 2001, has noticed that.

"He'll make a big difference there, " says Fahey. "For one, they won't be going blindly into anything. They'll be dealing with reality. No way were Mayo 15 points worse than Kerry last year but no way were they better either, yet going into that final the Mayo public had their rose-tinted glasses on, thinking they were going to take this one nicely.

O'Mahony would have controlled that and embraced the underdogs tag. In 2001 he had us believing that everyone felt we had no chance against Meath. But he believed in us and he had us believing in ourselves."

The confidence came from preparation. Before O'Mahony, Galway would gather at a hotel in the middle of Tuam on championship days, hop into their cars and join supporters in traffic. When O'Mahony took over, the group travelled together, by bus, by garda escort, at a time known days in advance, courtesy of a printed handout detailing their matchday itinerary. Even under John Maughan, with his military background and precision, Mayo had several preparatory glitches, like arriving at Croke Park only 30 minutes before the 2004 drawn All Ireland semi-final against Fermanagh.

Whether it was the cause or symptom of Mayo's future troubles is debatable but an apprehension came into their play which would remain for the rest of that summer. In six years playing for O'Mahony, Fahey can't recall one logistical gaffe. "The weather, "laughs Fahey, "was the only thing he couldn't control and I'd say he'd have tried his best there."

Of course, at times he's got it wrong. An anecdote cited to illustrate his exceptional "motivational" powers is the video he played minutes before the drawn 2000 All Ireland final. In the clip were the players' families, wearing Galway jerseys, waving Galway flags. It moved and affected the players alright - after 25 minutes they were seven points down. It was only when O'Mahony made more task-oriented calculations - bringing on Kevin Walsh, moving Padraic Joyce to centre forward - that Galway started approaching the kind of peak performance that O'Mahony had programmed. O'Mahony himself would have recognised that. "The emotional bangingthe-tables stuff is going out these days, " he would say three years later. "Fellas are calmer now and what's coming in is a more technical approach."

It's something Mayo are getting now - after every game, win or lose, the dressing room door is shut for 45 minutes as O'Mahony's management team absorb Martin Carney's stats to ensure no lazy attributions are imparted to the players - and it's something O'Mahony always welcomed.

Shortly after Mickey Harte wrote 'Kicking Down Heaven's Door', outlining a consultative, player-centred approach which was considered groundbreaking, O'Mahony hinted that "directing traffic" was an approach he too had been doing all along, just something he didn't wish to detail or disclose.

Fahey saw him use it first hand. Leaders like Ray Silke might have been born, but others like Padraic Joyce, in time, were developed. "He (O'Mahony) was very good at facilitating meetings, encouraging everyone to say their share.

You saw guys and their confidence growing in leaps and bounds. He was very good oneto-one as well. You could be having a cup of tea and he'd touch base with you. That was one of his skills, making time to meet up with you without you knowing. And not dictating to you. What he'd say is, 'Look, it's up to yourself, but I'd recommend you eat this?'" It's what he's best working with - people - and making them feel important to the cause. He recently stated how good it was to see Ronan McGarrity, still recovering from his testicular cancer operation, visit the dressing room.

In 2000 he kept Ja Fallon part of the Galway group when that player was out for the year with a cruciate ligament injury.

James Nallen might never start a championship game again but O'Mahony recognises he can provide the kind of leadership that Billy Byrne and George O'Connor offered Wexford in 1996. Last week O'Mahony gave Nallen the captain's armband to mark a record number of appearances by any Mayo player, and adapted "Let's win this one for Jimmy" as the match theme. In the wrong hands, it could have been forced and condescending, but in O'Mahony's it was sincere and appreciated.

As much as Mickey Moran tried to cultivate the notion of "family" last season, he alienated the county board. Under O'Mahony, they've been welcomed back into the loop.

Mayo didn't have any overnight stays this year, even for the trip in Cork; instead players were being dropped off at their homes at 4am, and out with their clubs 10 hours later. By empathising with the board's financial constraints and fixture list, O'Mahony knows such a gesture will be reciprocated. It already has;

after attending the Connacht under-21 semi-final, O'Mahony had a helicopter whisking the general election candidate off to the Fine Gael ard fheis.

In some dealings, though, he's had to use the iron fist with the silk glove. O'Mahony has identified that Conor Mortimer personifies so much of what's bad as well as good about the Mayo condition and that he must go to the next level if Mayo are to as well. When Joe Kernan stayed in the same hotel as Mayo the weekend of the 2004 All Ireland semi-final, he was struck by how Mortimer and Ciaran McDonald wore different gear to the rest of the panel; last December, a few nights after the panel were given the same training gear, Mortimer walked out with the wrong shorts only for O'Mahony to discreetly tell him to wear Mayo shorts like everyone else.

One night the DCU student was late for a session with the panel's Dublin-based players.

Just before training the following night, he was handed Jim Kilty's mobile phone. It was O'Mahony, checking to see if he was there. After a poor display in Donegal, Mortimer was dropped for Limerick, before being called back into the starting lineup against Fermanagh. Since then he's been Man of the Match in three of his four games, averaging 1-4 a match.

Every move of O'Mahony seems to have worked. David Heaney's switch to midfield;

Marty McNicholas and Kevin O'Neill coming on against Cork; Ger Brady's three points from play in Omagh after being moved into full forward; but some things aren't going to plan. Ciaran McDonald might never wear a Mayo jersey again. Twice he's resumed collective training and played some minutes in a challenge game, only to break down with his back injury. And politically, polls have O'Mahony seventh in a five-seat constituency.

At times it's been a surreal campaign. Last month himself and Beverly Flynn donned pyjamas in a playschool to help the Make-A-Wish foundation, while his election pamphlets have avoided any reference to the fact he coached Galway, something that initially seemed further proof of his reluctance to offend anyone.

Such caution, however, has been validated. Recently Fianna F�il opponent, John Carthy, besmirched O'Mahony's residency in Ballaghaderreen by remarking that "if they (the Mayo electorate) want to elected another TD in Roscommon", they were free to do so.

O'Mahony, born in the last house on the Mayo side of Ballaghaderreen, did not allow such a slur go unchallenged. "I have absolute trust in the people of Mayo to decide whether I am a Mayo person or not, " he responded in that diplomatic but forceful way of his. "I'll be concentrating on a positive campaign and while everyone is entitled to their opinion, I want to clarify the matter from my point of view."

His Mayoness is beyond question. Months before taking the Galway job, O'Mahony admitted that "I would love to manage a team to win the All Ireland title." He realised that ambition, yet here he is today, facing the team he guided to that All Ireland, wanting more.

"Winning an All Ireland for Mayo, I would say it would mean more to him, " contends Fahey. "When he was with us, he was fully committed to us, but whereas he wanted to win an All Ireland as a manager, we wanted to win it for Galway. He wants to win one for Mayo."

And will he? "Well, " says Kevin Walsh, "if this group don't win it under him, they won't win it at all."

He has three seasons to win it. Or to put it another way, Mayo are lucky to have him for three years.