Seán Moran On Gaelic GamesThud. All-Ireland finals define most seasons and Sunday was no exception. Twelve months ago Mickey Harte's revolution in Tyrone was complete when his team served out for their second title by beating Armagh and Kerry. Tyrone remain a ghost at Kerry's banquet but this year, ravaged by injuries, they were nowhere near the pace.

One slight concern is the reflection that, for a fourth successive year, the pre-season conviction that Sam Maguire would winter in Armagh, Kerry or Tyrone was proved so conclusively accurate.

The three counties have tested each other and driven themselves forward on the lessons learned in the process. Armagh are on the verge of dropping out of that select group but their tilt with a rejuvenated Kerry in the quarter-finals was the match of the season and would have been a worthy final.

Just a week ago with what has turned out already to be an embarrassingly earnest sense of certainty, this column featured the conviction that Mayo would be different from the Mayo of 2004.

The terms were stated using the imagery of the three-card trick.

It was impossible, the argument ran, for Mayo's apparent progression to be a sham because, not having been fooled two years previously, we knew. Just knew. The knowledge wasn't sufficient to convince that the trophy was going west but the final would be competitive at least.

In the shelled-out ruins of their latest calamity, many Mayo people were unsurprised. This wasn't related to Flann O'Brien-style western fatalism. Nor was it being wise after the event. They were too frustrated to be sentimental and too aware for anger.

Regardless of whether they believed in the notional improvement, most knew that the team they would be supporting last Sunday couldn't stand up to rational comparison with a revamped Kerry challenge. Ultimately that's all we need to know about the final.

It wasn't Mayo's fault they happened to be the fall guys on the big day. They had done what they could, which was to emerge from the considerably weaker side of the All-Ireland draw.

In 2004 it was hard to be too critical of that hammering by Kerry because essentially Mayo weren't supposed to have been in the final; they had over-achieved because of a chain of events triggered by the long-odds wildness of Fermanagh beating Armagh.

This year is a bit different. Coming through the Connacht-Leinster side of the draw, Mayo deserved their place on the big day and were credibly the best of the teams there. Dublin shouldn't have allowed it to happen - but they did and Mayo fully merited the win that day.

Would Dublin have done better in the final? They could hardly have done worse but equally the Leinster champions would have done well to finish on the wrong side by somewhere between six and double digits.

Necessarily the jury is still in its side-room pondering Dublin's credentials but three days ago the team and its management got a good lesson - without any of the trauma - on how high the bar is for winning All-Irelands.

Can the team return, appropriately enabled to combine that level of physical aggression and footballing skill?

The preferred bet on such an eventuality would be closer to a fiver than the deeds of your house.

Learning lessons is an important part of reaching the elite level where teams position themselves for All-Irelands.

Assisted by circumstance, Kerry passed their first two seasons under Jack O'Connor without being tested to the limit. It meant that going into last year's final against Tyrone, the team couldn't have known how they would get on in the company of a side whose intensity and preparations had been three years in development.

Even the memory of the 2003 semi-final for the 10 players who lined out both days wasn't sufficient to bridge that gap. Readiness for such contests is a combination of high-level training and matches played after a team has moved to that level.

The concept of training years applies: the amount of time spent preparing to the optimum in terms of training and lifestyle. By now O'Connor's team have reached a level of fitness and conditioning that no one on the Connacht-Leinster side of the draw would have lived with last weekend.

Kerry have moved on this year and a central event in that was the Armagh match. It may be that the poor form in Munster was something of a side issue but the collective desire to recover and do themselves justice was a powerful motivation.

Shrugging off the listlessness, clearing the air and the tactical adjustments all played a role but it's likely the stark option presented by the Armagh match was the catalyst.

This has happened before. Galway faced Armagh in the qualifiers in 2001, their season pockmarked with some early-season disharmony followed by a wretched championship defeat to Roscommon. John O'Mahony's reshuffle brought Tomás Mannion from corner back to centre back and the team cohered around the change.

It was harder in the days before the qualifiers allowed teams reconfigure and avail of the lessons and motivations that come with defeat all in the one season. But it still happened. Down won two All-Irelands by reconfiguring in the lead-up to two vital matches, both against Derry - a replay in 1991 and the fabled first round three years later - with Peter McGrath recasting corner back Barry Breen as firstly a centrefielder and subsequently a centre back.

Kieran Donaghy has provided a touch of fantasy to the season: from underdog to top dog. He was red carded against Cork in the drawn Munster final and missed the replay.

Donaghy left the pitch at Fitzgerald Stadium as a centrefielder and the next time he played was when returning to the same venue 20 days later as a full forward.

Some 50 days on and he has won his first All-Ireland, All Star and probably Footballer of the Year.

To say the Austin Stacks convert from basketball has redefined football is probably overstating the case. Style is agreed to be the way a team plays in order to accommodate the talent available.

If anyone thinks it's more didactic than that, ask yourself what would Joe Kernan and Mickey Harte do were they to come across a six-foot-five athlete with quick hands and excellent vision.

Empires don't last forever and there must be somewhere the seeds of a future successful revolt. But they're not easy to identify.

email: smoran@irish-times.ie