The football championship is two thirds over. All provinces have cleared the decks for their finals and only 21 matches - excluding any replays - remain before we can log the All-Ireland winners for 2002. They are likely to define what has been a low-key summer to date.

Last weekend however there were the first signs of stirring. This year's provincial finals will register a complete turnover of champions with all the title-holders having departed before the ultimate stage. Tyrone, Roscommon, Meath and Kerry are all gone and Roscommon departed for good.

In a way, this isn't exactly a brave new world because Kildare, Cork, Armagh and Galway are all multiple winners at provincial level in recent years. With respect to Tipperary and Sligo, Dublin and Donegal are the counties likely to gatecrash the provincial top table. Dublin have been knocking at the door in the past three years but Tommy Lyons has introduced quite a bit of new blood so the team is essentially new.

Maybe this will inject more vitality into the closing stages of the championships but while Dublin and Donegal are upbeat, there have been a few counties hitting the rocks and this has affected attendances.

But the World Cup and the unavailability of Croke Park have made the biggest impact on declining numbers. It is well to remember that it was only in round three of last year's qualifiers that the big crowds began to arrive. But the weekend just gone illustrates the perils of sinking public confidence.

In Castlebar fewer than 10,000 turned up for the meeting of Roscommon and Mayo - down from the 23,000 that watched last year's Connacht final between the counties. Then again, a final creates its own momentum and teams that reach one are more likely to have the breeze of optimism at their backs, as opposed to sides that have sustained demoralising defeats and begun to conceive doubts as to their overall direction.

Mayo and Roscommon certainly fitted that bill but, as expected, Roscommon fitted it a good deal more snugly. The pity for manager John Tobin, whose future in Roscommon is uncertain, is that he couldn't have had his two years with the county in reverse order and presided over what would have been substantial development rather than the sense of anti-climax current in the county.

Not that this constitutes a criticism of Tobin. His achievement with the side last year was startling and the Connacht title represented a major over-achievement by the team, and one from which there could be no realistic prospect of progress. He was also ill served (as were most of the other players) by the irresponsibility that came luridly to light after the weekend away in Derry and let down by the indiscipline of Francie Grehan, whom Tobin had appointed captain, in the first round match with Galway.

Another achievement, which probably gave him a roundabout satisfaction, was the consequence of victory over his own county Galway in last year's Connacht semi-final. In performing so well, Roscommon produced a perfect diagnostic of the problems facing Galway. With the qualifiers on hand, John O'Mahony was able to prescribe so effective a remedy that his team won the All-Ireland.

YOU can question whether Mayo have either the blueprint or the raw material to better themselves in this fashion. But they will approach round three in considerably better humour than they did round two.

Alarm bells began to ring last weekend for backers of Meath. Ollie Murphy's withdrawal from the team last Friday drifted the pendulum in Dublin's direction, though maybe not decisively (he had after all scored only a point in last year's Leinster final). But the news that Westmeath had flopped against Fermanagh shed a new perspective. Meath's win over their neighbours was the most substantial evidence that Sean Boylan's team were back in business.

With that evidence now in question, combined with Wexford's credentials being validated against Tyrone, the Croke Park picture began to look less clearcut.

For Westmeath, the the ebbing self-confidence in the county was visible from an attendance 40 per cent down on last year. To an extent Luke Dempsey's side have paid a heavy price for injuries that led to a demoralising NFL campaign and a quick exit from Division One. But the team will be very disappointed at the inability to build on last year - even in terms of performance.

Where does all this leave Meath and indeed Kerry? To what extent can they emulate the feats of Galway in turning an early championship exit into a launching pad for a revived season? We probably won't know for a while. Galway took a couple of rounds to find their rhythm after being so badly exposed by Roscommon.

It remains to be seen whether Kerry and Meath have the supply of emerging talent that John O'Mahony was able to deploy a year ago. But there was more to Galway's extensive refit. The move of Tomás Mannion to centre back and the acceptance of Michael Donnellan's preference for centrefield settled and strengthened the team. The key victories, against Armagh and Cork, were narrow, but they created a confidence and momentum.

Given that Murphy may need surgery and rest, can Meath recapture their own best form in his absence? In the aftermath of Sunday's match, Boylan was noticeably more agitated than he usually is in defeat. It's most unusual to hear the Meath manager complaining about goals conceded, particularly in such spurious circumstances as last weekend's. It may be that the tendency of his team to perform in such stop-go sequences is beginning to spook him a bit.

It's hard to be sure about Kerry given the terrible bereavement suffered by the team but they had already looked flat in the drawn match in Killarney. Maybe the redeployment of Moynihan to a more central role will revive the team's appetite but that still leaves the old question that Moynihan's previous move solved: what to do at full back.

Last year's Munster and Leinster champions will have one match to rehabilitate themselves, although Meath will not be taking Louth for granted. But thereafter the strength of the opposition will be on the rise and only then will the counties' prospects become more reliably apparent.

In other words, we ain't seen nothin' yet.