HE'S COUNTY A WARTS AND ALL DIARY FROM INSIDE THE CAMP:APOLOGIES TO Gerry Thornley, but plus ça change, plus cest la même chose. The summer started with talk about us having great strength in depth. The summer is going to finish with talk of us having great strength in depth.

Which is all very well and good unless you – ie me – happen to be that very strength in depth.

So what can I do? So I do what I can do: lose friends and burst up people.

“Earn the right, man,” I roared at one of our dilettantes Wednesday night, after launching one right on that sweet spot between his 10th and 11th ribs. I couldn’t have landed it better with crosshairs.

As he groaned and collapsed like a bouncy castle with the plug pulled out, I played on. Everyone else stopped. “Rod,” said one of our, and I quote, “teak-tough” defenders, “you’ll have five or six of us out of the final the way you’re going.”

I thought: “And that would be a bad thing, how?” I ignored him, just kept shouting for a return pass. Stayed on my feet. Never cracked once. They carted him out to the side like one of Páidí’s loaves of bread from Marooned.

Plenty of room for him out there: hey, he might even add to our strength in depth.

“Alright, girls,” I shouted on the restart, “anyone else afraid of breaking a nail?”

I’m going to be on that team, no matter what it takes. No one remembers subs. I know I’m playing things to suit myself. You won’t find me apologising for that.

Football is a team game played by individuals, all contributing to the team, but, ultimately, all retaining their individuality.

You can’t get into the zone kneeling in pews or thumping your chest. There will be time enough in October for rebuilding bridges.

Earn the right. That’s the key. I know I’ve earned it. Has everyone else? Can they look themselves in the mirror and say, like I can, “Rod, you know. They know. They know you know.”

Rob Kearney, now there’s a guy who has earned the right. I tweeted him when I saw them passing through the airport. “Alright, handsome,” I wrote, “let’s be having you now. Just E-X-P-L-O-D-E.”

It got circulated by so many it reached top tweet status. So did his reply. “Are you not playing yourself at all this year? They could do with you.”

See what I mean? No one remembers subs.

No one remembers semi-final losers either, they say. I’m not so sure we’ll forget Donegal in a hurry. I knew Jim McGuinness before he went off and became Mr Incredibly Shrewd and, sorry, but I just can’t take him seriously. And, you know what, I don’t think he’d want me to either.

This Big Bad Jim is not the Jim I know. Every time I see him on there with the studious look – eyes betraying deep thought, curls and goatee gone west – I expect him to break into uncontrollable laughter.

Now Big Bad Jim is public enemy number one. Who knew? I suppose I could give him a bit of advice how he might make himself comfortable on that thorny perch.

From where I’m standing, Donegal committed no crime. You’ll find zero complaints here.

People want it every way. Jim does what I would do in the same situation: he does what he can. I’m pretty sure he took a look at the stuff he had, drew a circle around Michael Murphy, and said, right, what am I going to make with the rest of this?

Maybe they have a few good backs. But good backs don’t win stuff. If people are down to talking up good backs, I rest my case.

Jim made something out of them. That’s the achievement.

Last Sunday, what were they meant to do?

“Got enough room there, Berno?”

“Alright, Diarmuid, come at me there on my left, thats my weak side?”

“Oooh, I do say, nice point there Alan, old boy.”

Give me a break. Give Big Bad Jim a break. Give Big Bad Jim a haircut. Give him whatever you want, but don’t pin the death of Gaelic football on him. Big Jim, he ain’t no game-shooter.

Wednesday night, I got a shot at our ’keeper too. The ball dropped. So did he. The ball bounced back up. He didn’t.

“Ah Rod,” come on, they roared, “that was a mile late. You’re going to do serious damage here.”

I jogged around the goal, and came back out, slowly, provocatively, inspecting the carnage. Bottles of water. Smelling salts. Vacant looks. And that was only the medical party.

“Last time I looked,” I said, “there’s no one watching to see if you twitch before making your run, this is no Usain Bolt job.”

And on out the field. Doing what I can do. Every moment an opportunity. Nothing set in stone. Chaos brings chaos. Chaos is good.

Doing it, doing it, doing it.