The physical toll of a condensed schedule of Championship games was laid bare in the cold reality of stats and numbers for Tyrone as their All-Ireland challenge fell apart in 2023.
Now they find themselves in the same dilemma all over again, faced with tough games on three successive weekends as the only available path to the quarter-finals.
Only round robin group winners are entitled to a week off ahead of the last eight ties, while the rest are left to scrap it out for those priceless tickets to Croke Park.
There can be a heavy price to pay for the exertions wrought by a punishing journey along a hard and unforgiving road.
Output levels dipped for the likes of Tyrone and Mayo when they eventually made it to the quarter-finals last season, running out of steam and crashing to heavy defeats to fresher Kerry and Dublin teams respectively.
“We definitely suffered last year in the quarter-final because of it,” said Red Hand goalkeeper Niall Morgan as he prepares to face Roscommon in this weekend’s preliminary quarter-final.
“The STATSports guys that do our GPS said that ourselves and Mayo, they noticed a massive drop-off in the stats in the quarter-finals, because we had gone three weekends in a row.
“So it’s massive that we get good recovery over the next week and be ready to go again next weekend.
“We generally are a fit team, but it’s getting good recovery, and it’s great because we have so many fresh legs.
“Last year we had so many injuries, but we have fresh legs, we have the U20s who have come in now.
“A couple of them haven’t even been seen yet, but I have no doubt that they’re going to have a big part to play over the next couple of weeks.
“Definitely next weekend the bench is going to be huge. We saw how it affected us against Donegal in the Ulster game after the Cavan game. We had a lot of injuries that day, and it definitely affected us coming down the stretch whenever we didn’t have the fresh legs to put on.”
Morgan’s own stats have been exemplary in recent weeks, with four clean sheets in the last four Championship games and a string of personal displays that no other goalkeeper in the country has come close to matching.
While keeping goals out at one end, his impact at the other has been huge, creating scores with his range of passing, not to mention the seven points he scored in those four ties.
“We’re taking pride in clean sheets, we spoke about it before the game, keeping goals out.
“A lot of people put in down to luck, how things go, but our back line has tightened up immensely compared to the last couple of seasons.
“That’s not to say it’s just going to happen and happen. You have to work and you have to keep being ruthless in defence, and we were ruthless again.”
Decision-making defines the fine line between success and failure for the modern ‘keeper, many of whom have found themselves floundering helplessly far from their goal as the ball nestles in the net.
Morgan is arguably the game’s most adventurous net-minder, but time and again he makes the right calls, trusting his instincts to tell him when to stay and when to go.
“I’m getting older and maybe the experience had helped me out.
“I’m not going to say I’m lucky, because I practice a lot,” he said.
One of those split-second moments of decision saw him race 45 metres from his line to contest possession with Chris Og Jones in last weekend’s clash with Cork.
Not only did he win the ball, but the incident resulted in a black card for the Cork full forward, and during his absence Tyrone seized control with the game’s only goal.
“There’s different games that I wouldn’t go for that, but I just felt that I was going to make it before him.
“I suppose other ‘keepers would maybe have made their way back to the line or been a wee bit late, so, yeah, it’s going well for me at the minute, but I have to keep working and keep making it happen.
“I think playing outfield for the club definitely is a massive help. You can gauge it a wee bit better and you’re making the decisions maybe a wee bit quicker.”