Former Offaly All Ireland winner Daithi Regan feels Galway have a decent shot at Liam McCarthy Cup glory in 2017 but believes "the jury is still out" on whether the Tribesmen can end their long wait.
The 2017 Allianz League champions face Dublin in their Leinster Championship opener on Sunday and while Regan feels Galway have a good chance overall, he also talked long time trends with Off The Ball.
"There's no doubt they will be favourites this weekend and I do give Galway a good shot in the All Ireland," he said.
"But to be honest, I would give Galway a good shot in the All Ireland every year. And in sport, luck plays a part."
After citing some examples of Galway's unlucky moments down through the years, Regan continued: "The problem in Galway was, unless it was winning an All Ireland, it wasn't a success. So bringing together a bunch of players, getting to an All Ireland, showing yourselves up very well compared to the chances that you would have been given at the start of the year, just didn't seem to be good enough to successive Galway county boards."
And he doesn't feel that getting over the line in 2017 would not mean a revolution has taken place.
Regan said: "Sometimes a bit of luck can go your way. Does that say if Galway are to win the All Ireland final this year, that it's been totally revolutionised what they've done the last couple of years? No, the players put the neck on the block and at the end of the day, we've seen it with Limerick and Cork over the years. When you do things like that, credit in a sense can be given to you in that you were willing to put the head over the parapet. If you don't do anything different than what you did the previous two years, you leave yourself wide open. The jury is out at the moment. They've done what they've done. They look good today but Galway teams have looked good today previously.
"But what Galway don't have to contend with this year is a Kilkenny team in their pomp for a four or a five year period."
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