The final few days of campaigning in the Dublin Central and Galway West byelection campaigns are upon us, and the candidates and their parties are in their final push. Voting takes place from 7am to 10pm on Friday and with crowded fields of candidates in both constituencies and transfers certain to be decisive, every preference is precious. The margins between success and failure could be wafer thin, so expect a frantic final few days on the ground. Here is what to watch out for as the campaigns enter the home stretch.Time to prioritise With limited time and resources, now is the time to decide where to concentrate firepower. Fine Gael will prioritise the campaign in Galway where its candidate Seán Kyne is in the hunt for the seat. In Dublin, Fine Gael’s Ray McAdam has fought a decent campaign and performed credibly in last week’s Irish Times/TG4 opinion poll. But he won’t be involved in the last few counts and so the party will concentrate its resources in Galway. Party leader and Tánaiste Simon Harris plans to be there on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. It would be surprising if Sinn Féin did not make the opposite judgment: to concentrate its attention on Dublin Central where Janice Boylan led last week’s poll but will face a stiff challenge for the seat from the Social Democrats’ Daniel Ennis. Party sources say they expect activists from around the city to flood into Dublin Central for the last few days. The polls suggest Fianna Fáil is not competitive in either constituency so it won’t lose sleep over the final few days. Independent Ireland isn’t running a candidate in Dublin so has already made the decision to pile in on Galway West where candidate Noel Thomas is favourite for the seat.[ What are voters’ five big issues in Dublin Central and Galway West byelections?Opens in new window ]Getting out the voteTurnout tends to be lower in byelections than at general elections, which only increases the importance of a party getting out its supporters to turn up on the day. Sinn Féin already has a big vote in Dublin Central, home to party leader Mary Lou McDonald, and is putting a lot of work into canvassing those areas where McDonald does well. If the main Opposition party can secure the 7,600 or so voters who voted for Sinn Féin at the last election to come out again, that gives its candidate Boylan a significant head start. Fine Gael will think the same about the 5,500 votes won in 2024 by Paschal Donohoe (whose departure from politics triggered this byelection). But the party’s fear is that they were Donohoe votes, rather than Fine Gael votes. [ Investigation: Suspicious betting on Gerry Hutch in Dublin Central byelectionOpens in new window ]All parties will have a get-out-the-vote operation on polling day, but it is vital for Sinn Féin here if it is to stand a chance of winning.Beg, borrow, steal transfersNobody is getting elected on the first count: these elections will be decided by the transfers between candidates. These are unpredictable but will be influenced by factors such as geography, ideology, support/opposition to the Government, as well as candidates’ performance in the campaign. In Dublin, Ennis of the Social Democrats looks set to benefit from transfers from the Greens, Labour, People Before Profit and even Fine Gael, while Sinn Féin should do well out of transfers from Independent candidate Gerry Hutch, who himself will have difficulty getting transfers from anywhere but fellow Independent Malachy Steenson.Fine Gael candidate in the Galway West byelection, Seán Kyne, travelled to Inis Oírr to canvass islanders for votes. Video: Enda O'Dowd In Galway, whoever emerges as the leading left-wing candidate – The Irish Times/TG4 poll by Ipsos B&A at the start of the campaign suggested it could be Labour’s Helen Ogbu – should receive transfers from the other left-wing parties and Independents to challenge Independent Ireland’s Noel Thomas and Fine Gael’s Seán Kyne. And then, whoever is in third place when it comes to the last three will decide who finishes in first place. So, for example, would Ogbu (if it was her) send her transfers to Kyne ahead of Thomas? The order of elimination will be crucial. Who will win Dublin Central? Listen | 38:05Expect canvassers to be pursuing second, third and fourth preferences just as keenly as first preferences. And remember: the enemy of my enemy is my friend.Manage, manage, manage those expectationsThough the byelections won’t change the balance of power in the Dáil, they have a political importance beyond that measurement partly because they dominate the political agenda for a few weeks. Whether they have a more enduring political legacy depends how much they change the political context. Wins for the Social Democrats and Independent Ireland would confirm them as coming forces.Jack Horgan Jones takes a closer look at what the numbers in the TG4/Irish Times poll mean for the upcoming byelection in Dublin Central. Video: Bryan O'Brien The level of expectation management in Fianna Fáil speaks about the nervousness that the results could kick off another round of attempts to get a heave going against leader Micheál Martin, though there was little sign of that at the party’s ardfheis last weekend. A win in Galway West would be a welcome fillip for Harris, reassuring his party. While if Sinn Féin fails to win in Dublin Central, it would cause unconcealable damage to McDonald. If Labour wins in Galway with left-wing transfers – and if the Social Democrats pull off the same feat in Dublin – it will strengthen the case for left-wing co-operation in the future.“We all try to manage expectations,” says one party bigwig. “But when the boxes are opened on Saturday and the votes aren’t there, it still hurts. And it still has consequences.”