WITH half of them resembling extras from the Braveheart movie, Tyrone's 'warrior' instincts could yet carry them to a third All-Ireland senior title next month, on the evidence of Saturday's demolition of Dublin.
Seventy minutes of composed, determined and exhilarating football has transformed the season and made fools of those who were predicting the passing of the torch from the Red Hands to the Dubs.
Hindsight can make footballing sages of us all but while there were some who believed that Mickey Harte's men would edge past the Leinster champions in front of a packed Croke Park, few could have foreseen such a massacre under ashen grey Dublin skies.
It was the end of an era all right, however it wasn't Harte calling time on his inter-county career, but rather his counterpart in the other dressing room Paul 'Pillar' Caffrey who stepped down after seeing his side completely out-played and out-thought.
The 3-14 to 1-8 All-Ireland quarter-final drubbing accurately reflected the gulf in terms of tactical nous and intensity between the sides, all but one of Tyrone's scoring tally coming from open play as they weaved one devastating attacking pattern after another.
The sheer quality and commitment exhibited by the 'bearded' Red Hand wonders at a stunned Headquarters was in sharp contrast to the stuttering, unconvincing showings produced so often earlier in the season and they now find themselves ranked as second favourites behind Kerry to lift the Sam Maguire trophy.
One of those 'bristled' heroes for the victors was corner-back Ciaran Gourley who has stepped into the breach superbly in the absence of the injured PJ Quinn to make the number four jersey his own of late.
He formed part of a tight-knit, supremely disciplined Tyrone rearguard which completely snuffed out and frustrated a much-vaunted Dublin attack, while also exploiting the Dubs fragility to bomb up the field himself to constructive use on occasions.
Gourley accepted that such an invigorating display had not been seen from Tyrone for quite a numbers of seasons, going back to the All-Ireland triumph of 2005.
"It's been a few years since we've had a day like that and produced a performance of that magnitude. We haven't set the world alight in the games we've played so far. We came through the Qualifiers and we were improving bit by bit each week.
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But we knew coming up to play the Dubs it would take a huge push to get past them and lucky enough we produced the goods and we are through to the semi-finals."
Gourley has taken advantage of the unfortunate back injury sustained by young Moortown defender PJ Quinn ahead of the Mayo qualifier to nail down a berth in the defence, though he stresses that every player has to guard against complacency to ensure their spot in the starting fifteen.
" It was a wonderful team effort on Saturday and everyone that came on played their part. Competition for places this year has been phenomenal especially in the Championship with every one battling for a place and I was just happy to get on and show what I could do. When you are playing you have to make the most of it.
" I was watching the game the last day when PJ unfortunately got an injury. I managed to get in and hold onto my place. It's unlucky for PJ because he did nothing wrong, injury caused him to miss out, but hopefully he'll be back flying fit and battling for a spot in the semi-final. It's up to me to perform well and to try and hold onto that place."
The nature of Tyrone GAA means that overnight and on the back of one performance the side are transformed from has-beens to world beaters. Yet Gourley insists that the squad themselves won't buy into such hype and will remain with their feet very firmly planted on the ground as they build-up now to the semi-final collision with dangerous dark horses Wexford on Sunday August 31.
" We're no world beaters, indeed very far from it based on the evidence of a lot of our matches this season. Dublin performed way below scratch whereas we probably performed above ourselves so the truth of where we stand is probably somewhere in between.
" Mickey I say will guarantee that no-one in the camp gets too carried away with that victory. Before this game everyone was saying we were finished and that the tank was empty which wasn't the case either. But you can't switch from that view to the other extreme and say we are the top dogs. As things stand we are in the semi-finals which is a good spot to be and we can build on that."
And the Rock player , who lined out in an All-Ireland Final with his club side at Croke Park back in February, is wary of the challenge that Jason Ryan's surprise packets Wexford could pose in eleven days time. Despite the fact that the Dubs hammered them by 23 points in the Leinster Final, Gourley is impressed by the manner in which they bounced back from that reversal to sweep aside both Down and Armagh.
" I wouldn't read too much into how the Leinster Final turned out. It was one of those days, especially in the second half, when everything went wrong for them. You have to give Wexford massive credit for turning around that defeat. The performance they put in against Armagh was very impressive so we can't afford to underestimate them.
" Armagh and maybe Down were complacent against them and were made to pay the price, so we have to be on our guard if we are not going to be the third Ulster side to go down that route against Wexford.
" We've set a high standard for ourselves now which isn't going to be easy to maintain but we have to aim to keep up to that level the next day if we want to reach the All-Ireland Final."
