Incoming Tyrone joint-manager Feargal Logan has paid tribute to his predecessor Mickey Harte's "outstanding record" and said the county had a decent crop of players coming through from the underage ranks.
Logan, a midfielder on the Tyrone team which lost the 1995 All-Ireland final to Dublin in contentious circumstances, was appointed as joint-manager alongside Brian Dooher back in November.
They face a daunting challenge in replacing Harte, who was at the helm in Tyrone for 18 championship seasons, leading the county to all three of its All-Ireland titles during a wildly successful period in the noughties.
While the decade just gone proved less successful, as Harte sought the smooth the transition between one generation of players and the next, Tyrone still won consecutive Ulster titles in 2016 and 2017, reaching the All-Ireland final in 2018.
Amid increasing restlessness in the county, Harte stepped down in November after the Tyrone management committee turned down his request for a one-year extension and then surprised the Gaelic football world by taking over in Louth.
Tyrone turned to Logan and Dooher, the same duo which had led Tyrone to the All-Ireland u-21 title in 2015, with the former as manager and the latter functioning as a selector.
"Obviously, Mickey has an outstanding record and gave outstanding service to Tyrone," Logan told Saturday Sport on RTÉ Radio 1.
"It's never going to be easy. Let's just hope it all works out going into the future.
"But in one sense, there was always going to be a time when things had to move on. That's where we find ourselves."
Tyrone's standing in the pecking order is uncertain at present.
Ten years after their most recent All-Ireland title, Harte guided them back to the All-Ireland decider through the back-door two years ago, but they never seriously looked like winning against Dublin and, since then, Donegal - notwithstanding their Ulster final hiccup in 2020 - have regained their supremacy in the province.
Tyrone's experience of the retro format in 2020 was short-lived, with their loss to Donegal in the championship opener in Ballybofey ending their interest in the competition.
"Tyrone would always back themselves against anybody. Let's open it by saying that," insists Logan.
"Going forward from that, you'd have to say that the Dubs seem to be operating at a different level at the moment.
"Then, there probably are a posse of chasers and I think we're in that posse of four or five chasers. We just have to knuckle down here and see if we can bridge the gap."
While accepting that the generation of players who delivered All-Ireland success to Tyrone in 2003, 2005 and 2008 were exceptional, Logan is nonetheless bullish about the crop coming through.
"There's no doubt we had a flush of talent in the noughties and that brought its own rewards to us all. But we'd like to think we have a good feed of players through minors and u-20s.
"That has been the case in Tyrone. We're a big football county. When all that marries in together and you get the flush of talent, we hope for as much success as possible.
"But there was a serious set of players back in the noughties. The Dubs have a serious set of players at the moment and that's life.
"We're in a county where football is a deep-rooted tradition and wearing the jersey is a deep honour. The beauty is that we always find ourselves blessed in Tyrone with a squad of players that are interested in playing for the county and interested in doing the best they can."
The new management team's preparation time for the 2021 season will be shorter than before with the league abridged and the championship set to conclude in July.
"It's a wee bit more cut-throat now with the league split in two. Of course, we'd love seven games across Ireland and getting a good look at teams - and even more so, getting a good look at your own team.
"The back-door will not involve Division 3 and 4 from now on. So, it's going to be a shorter, sharper season and it's going to be a bit more cut-throat.
"You're not going to have as much time to re-habilitate. But it's going to be exciting stuff for everyone involved."
