Tyrone v Donegal - Sunday 18th June at 2pm

[Ball Hopper]

Even tho we were missing from the final for a few years we were seriously competitive during that time, which is a good state of affairs considering the "transition" It took big performances for Donegal o beat us and it feels like we have come out the other side of it now.

Since 2011 have Donegal Tyrone or Monaghan beaten the other two in one year, I dont think they have?

Tyrone beat both in 2007, the last time one of the three beat the other two per a wikipedia review.

[omaghjoe]

McGinley pulled off some great scores but it drives me mad when a player shoots high in a one on one position. Cavanagh and Brennan should have slid their attempts along the ground. If we can start burying a higher percentage of our goal chances then I think we really have a genuine chance at an AI.

Annoys me when a commentator makes a standard save into an act of phyics defiance.

You can almost hear the commentators brain kicking into reverse when he sees the replay! But nah, I'll just keep with my original wrong analysis.
On the shooting, Monaghan's McManus is brilliant in those one on one situations. Always seems to go low.

Completely agree regarding McManus, always keeps it low making it almost impossible to save. Ironically, I think that's what Tiernan was attempting as well, only he slightly ballsed it up! Still went in though!

What are you on about? He saw the advancing keeper going to ground so he decided to ricohet it of the ground and over him. A complete mastersroke by Tiernan, if Messi had done it, it would be produced as evidence of the second coming

[delgany]

It was great to see the smugness wiped of Martin mc Hugh s face on Sunday. The kids were great in february alright......whats that  saying,  " leagues for playing in ....championships for winning "

Different gravy

[omagh_gael]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00d0c9j

Game's now available on iPlayer.

[nrico2006]

Fed up hearing all the excuses about this being such a young Donegal team.  Tyrones team is littered with young players, yet before the game it was apparently the youth of Donegal that was going to win.  This was all a result of lazy journalism, reading far too much into a league where teams have done well in previous years due to ramping up their training earlier and simply being further down the road of the other teams in the Spring.

[Fuzzman]

I don't think it's the fact they are so young but that for a lot of them it was their first real serious Ulster championship match whereas only Tyrone's Mulgrew was in the same boat.

Jim has his say and as expected he tries to be sensitive towards his old management colleague but it was always going to be tough. Gallagher probably wants to move away from their old style but he got badly burnt on Sunday, not just from the sun.

Jim McGuinness: Lack of defensive intensity proved Donegal's downfall from Irish Times
With some tweaking, Rory Gallagher's side are good enough to bounce back from defeat

If you are a Donegal or Meath supporter, then yesterday was a blue Monday, regardless of the beautiful weather.
Supporters are left feeling terribly helpless whenever they see their team take a heavy beating on a hot summer's day or evening. Both Kildare-Meath and Donegal-Tyrone are big rivalries, too, with a lot of history and shared experience and that creates within the occasion an almost desperate sense to prove themselves to one another – as teams, as supporters, as counties.
I feel that was particularly true in Clones on Sunday. Tyrone and Donegal have been engaged in a fairly primal battle for supremacy for the past six years and I would think they both felt this was a game that could not be lost.
That pressure weighed more heavily on Donegal because of how the Ulster final finished last year. It was a bleak day for all Donegal supporters. It was remarked afterwards that the young players struggled. And that was true. But so did a lot of the more senior players. The guys who are integral to the team struggled out there as well. That needs to be pointed out.
For me, the bigger picture in terms of what happened hasn't changed from last year. In terms of any analysis I might do on the game, you could just provide a link to last year's column here after the Ulster final. The scoreline was different but the approach was just the same.
Did Tyrone bring anything new on Sunday? I would say hand on heart: no. Had they bodies back? Yes. Did they have intensity in defence? Yes. Was their structure and processes of the highest order? Yes.
Now, they had more energy and freedom and committed to their transition to attack really well. Once they got the turnover they looked to run the pitch width -wide and looked for that dink ball in. They also looked to switch the play with the diagonal ball and what they brought to the table was precisely what you would expect. But we knew all that about Tyrone.

I suppose a bigger question is where Donegal are right now. I went to bed on Sunday night with the game on my mind and was thinking about it first thing on Monday morning. It felt like being back in the Noughties when Tyrone just owned the pitch and Clones was eerily quiet long before the end of the game.
I am conscious of how this may be interpreted: as the former Donegal manager criticising the current Donegal manager. It's not about that. I am a Donegal supporter now. And I know we are better than that.

A trap
And I saw all the good work that Rory did with the team over the winter. I feel like Donegal fell into a trap on Sunday and the game became a nightmare for them. I don't feel that this means Tyrone are necessarily out of sight for Donegal now for a few years. In fact, I believe Donegal could beat Tyrone later this summer – if they go back to the principles that they were working on during the league.
Maybe I am not living in reality. Maybe I am wedded to 2011-14 when I watch Donegal. Maybe I am asking myself: why are they not doing this or that without knowing the actuality of what is going on at training or the players available etc? And maybe I need to move on in my thinking. I accept all of that may be true.
But I genuinely find that difficult to do because a lot of the things Donegal are trying to do are based on the principles present during the time Rory and I stood on the sideline. That is not me being critical; it is me trying to figure out, from the outside, what Donegal are doing. And it hits you hard when you are seven down at half-time and then it is ten points and you have that old feeling of queasiness and dread. But if Donegal can erase this defeat and focus on the principles of the league, I feel they can get back on track.
What gave Donegal hope for this summer was that the management team introduced a lot of young legs in the team. The Donegal system requires energy and intensity and throughout the national league, the word being tossed about quite a lot was 'pace'.
Of course, what you lost were guys with big stature and power. And they were replaced with young guys who are light and full of pace. Some of the problems from last summer were addressed in the league. There was pace in the attack and players were getting ahead of the ball again and attacking. So it seemed like the Donegal game plan was evolving into what is required if you want to play that brand of football at the elite level.
But Sunday's game was a carbon copy of last year's Ulster final except the Donegal energy and intensity wasn't there. Both Tyrone and Donegal play an extreme brand of football. There are trade-offs. With 14 men back, you leave yourself very hard to beat and there will be a lot of turnovers. But if you are not getting those turnovers, you have a problem.
If you look at Kildare-Meath, there was a similar dynamic at play. Meath were notionally playing a sweeper. He was trying to get back when the ball was travelling towards the Kildare inside line. That is not a sweeper. That is a guy trying to get back to help in the secondary phase of defence.

Think of Mark McHugh with Donegal in 2011 and 2012. His job was to set up in front of the opposition marksman and anticipate. The game was in front of him. The Meath player couldn't do that because he was waiting to see where the ball was going. Even though the concept is similar, the actuality is miles apart.

Trade-off
So if you go back to Donegal, the trade-off of having so many men back has to be intensity. You have to push out, make sure the opposition works for each possession and once they take the ball in, you challenge to dispossess. That is what Kildare were doing. As soon Meath came in, half backs and midfielders fell back and there were 10 players designated to defend the D. And then they had four players up as outlet players. It meant they retained an offensive structure.
Those four guys had to be marked. But all of this is only possible if you are intensive and aggressive defensively. Kildare turned the ball far more often than Donegal – with fewer players back. And not only that, once they forced the turnover, they could kick it. Donegal only had Patrick McBrearty up front as an outlet.
So what were the key levels of performance on Sunday? The levels defensively were that Meath could not get back quickly enough. They lacked defensive shape. Donegal had incredible defensive shape but no intensity. Like, Donegal were actually incredibly well set up to defend. That should be acknowledged. They had two or three guys man-marking and the others covering space and then a line along the 45. But that should have been the start position. That should have been their platform to hassle and hound Tyrone.
Instead, Tyrone took a leaf from Dublin's book and just played the ball between the 20 metres of unmanned space in front of the Donegal defensive 45. They used that area to suck Donegal out and then inject pace at the right time to create raids inside the Donegal cover. I think this is significant. I feel there is a tactic missing from Gaelic football right now that could solve a lot of problems for teams playing against Tyrone, Kerry and Dublin.
That area of the field has been identified as the neutral zone for teams facing a defensive structure. For instance, Tyrone's decision-makers could survey their options at their leisure knowing that Donegal's defence was laid out in front of them. They move the ball in complete control and composure and what that says to the opposition is: we are controlling the terms here. If you want the ball, come out and get it. And when you make the move, we will find the space and hurt you.
Now, what if Donegal said: we will defend with 10 players. But see the other four? We will play them on the defensive 65. That way, teams can set a trap or close the net, rather, so once the opposition hits that offensive 45 they must either go through or deal with the pressure coming from behind. I think that can be used against Dublin and Tyrone to force them psychologically out of their comfort zone.

Defensive intensity
Donegal used to have a game plan based on defensive intensity. I feel Rory's system is not predicated on that. My feeling is that his thinking is: we don't need to be that intense; by having more numbers back, we will always be close to the opposition. And they were. But the problem was that they didn't lay a hand on them.
At the other end of the field, Donegal continued to run the ball and always supporting it from behind, resulting in the attack stagnating along the Tyrone 45. So again, by reverting to that Ulster final 2016 game plan, none of their good league work was able to come to fruition.

I just feel this approach is too extreme and therefore doesn't work. And it became our only option on Sunday. That is the big dilemma here. Why build a way to attack all through league and then on the biggest day, when the pressure is most intense, did we revert to that style? I don't know the answer to this, any more than any other Donegal supporter.
But I do believe Donegal can fix this. They are young. The reason I say that is that the signs were there in the national league. The positive aspects to their play going forward are still within the group. They are still viable options for the team. But if they are going to bring that many bodies back, they need to defend like a pack of wolves.
It was demoralising to see Tyrone players just dropping the shoulder and saunter into the heart of our defence. And I feel that pressing out and squeezing from behind could change that. Take away that luxury of Tyrone making their decisions in their own time. You can see how comfortable they were on Sunday at keeping it, keeping it, waiting and a wee fist past and then a sharp incision and a shot at goal.
Those young Donegal lads understood that they couldn't get the ball off Tyrone. And that is hard. So it was a demoralising defeat. It was a tough one to take and there is a psychological thing there also. Donegal have to come together now and acknowledge that everyone is going to write them off.
Before the game it was a toss of a coin as to who would win. They need to remember that. They also need to identify their strengths and go with those and get to the bottom of why they were so inhibited last year in the Ulster final and why that was replicated in Sunday's match.
For me, this is critical. Get to the bottom of that and they can start to move forward again.

[J70]

Fed up hearing all the excuses about this being such a young Donegal team.  Tyrones team is littered with young players, yet before the game it was apparently the youth of Donegal that was going to win.  This was all a result of lazy journalism, reading far too much into a league where teams have done well in previous years due to ramping up their training earlier and simply being further down the road of the other teams in the Spring.

Talk about lazy thinking!

The issue was that so many of them had never played in a serious senior championship game. Mulligan, Brennan, Thompson, Doherty, McGee, Carroll, Langan... all first time in such a game. Eoin McHugh played last year. Ciaran Gillespie played a couple of matches last year.

[omagh_gael]

Fed up hearing all the excuses about this being such a young Donegal team.  Tyrones team is littered with young players, yet before the game it was apparently the youth of Donegal that was going to win.  This was all a result of lazy journalism, reading far too much into a league where teams have done well in previous years due to ramping up their training earlier and simply being further down the road of the other teams in the Spring.

Talk about lazy thinking!

The issue was that so many of them had never played in a serious senior championship game. Mulligan, Brennan, Thompson, Doherty, McGee, Carroll, Langan... all first time in such a game. Eoin McHugh played last year. Ciaran Gillespie played a couple of matches last year.

Only got a chance to watch the game last night. Martin McHugh wasn't happy with Jason McGee coming off before the break. I thought it a bit strange myself. Granted he wasn't having a stormer but a man his size is always useful to catch/break ball. What's your thoughts here, J70?

[Maroon Manc]

I wouldn't know the exact numbers and ages but looking at both teams it looks like Donegal had a lot more players aged 23 and under and would imagine 7 of that Donegal team that started would have less than 5 championship appearance to their name.

[Jayop]

I wouldn't know the exact numbers and ages but looking at both teams it looks like Donegal had a lot more players aged 23 and under and would imagine 7 of that Donegal team that started would have less than 5 championship appearance to their name.

I paused the video where they named the teams and they had the players ages, and we (Tyrone) had an average age of 26.07 starting the game yesterday compared to Donegal's 23.93 so just over two years older per man on average.

That 26 year average has to be near perfect and what you'd want. We seem now to have a great mix of older experienced players with McCarren and Sean Cavanagh in their 30's and Colm Cavanagh 29 and then a lot of these young lads from Mulgrew at 19 right through.

Exciting panel this year but with Sean packing it in after this summer we really need to get as much out of his experience as we can this summer.

[Il Bomber Destro]

Fed up hearing all the excuses about this being such a young Donegal team.  Tyrones team is littered with young players, yet before the game it was apparently the youth of Donegal that was going to win.  This was all a result of lazy journalism, reading far too much into a league where teams have done well in previous years due to ramping up their training earlier and simply being further down the road of the other teams in the Spring.

To be fair there were 7 or 8 Donegal players who never started a game of that magnitude and it showed.

I think if there's one criticism that should be pointed at Rory Gallagher, it would be that some of these lads should have been integrated a lot quicker. A run in the qualifiers might do them the world of good.

Why did McGlynn go off Sunday? Injury? He's been a huge player for Donegal over the years but like Lacey he looks like he's at the end of the road.

[ned]

I wouldn't know the exact numbers and ages but looking at both teams it looks like Donegal had a lot more players aged 23 and under and would imagine 7 of that Donegal team that started would have less than 5 championship appearance to their name.

I paused the video where they named the teams and they had the players ages, and we (Tyrone) had an average age of 26.07 starting the game yesterday compared to Donegal's 23.93 so just over two years older per man on average.

That 26 year average has to be near perfect and what you'd want. We seem now to have a great mix of older experienced players with McCarren and Sean Cavanagh in their 30's and Colm Cavanagh 29 and then a lot of these young lads from Mulgrew at 19 right through.

Exciting panel this year but with Sean packing it in after this summer we really need to get as much out of his experience as we can this summer.

Sean Cavanagh played okay on Sunday but I thought some of his decision making was poor, especially the goal chance in first half where his shot was straight at the keeper. Should have passed. Seemed to hold onto the ball too long at times when getting the pass away quickly seemed to be the easier and better option. Is he trying to hard if this is his last season?

[Fuzzman]

I thought the same Ned, that whilst he did quite well out around the middle and set up Brennan for his goal chance, I thought he was far too slow releasing the ball at times and if the roles were reversed for his big goal chance then Sludden would have drawn the defender and released the ball to Sean who would be screaming for it.

Another time he was running into men on the 40 and whilst he kept possession he kicked a silly short pass no where near its target instead of a simple quick handpass outside him much earlier in the move.

Just bad decision making I think and probably thinks he needs to stand up and take these chances rather than looking around him.
Still, I think he's a handy man to have out around the MF where he can make a good mark from time to time and run from deep

[Maroon Manc]

Fed up hearing all the excuses about this being such a young Donegal team.  Tyrones team is littered with young players, yet before the game it was apparently the youth of Donegal that was going to win.  This was all a result of lazy journalism, reading far too much into a league where teams have done well in previous years due to ramping up their training earlier and simply being further down the road of the other teams in the Spring.

Seems like the majority got carried away with their league form, as you say they were just ahead of everyone else in terms of training like Roscommon last year.

To be fair its a very young inexperienced Donegal team and unless some of those who opted out return next year its hard to make a case for them staying as one of the top teams.

[BennyHarp]

I thought the same Ned, that whilst he did quite well out around the middle and set up Brennan for his goal chance, I thought he was far too slow releasing the ball at times and if the roles were reversed for his big goal chance then Sludden would have drawn the defender and released the ball to Sean who would be screaming for it.

Another time he was running into men on the 40 and whilst he kept possession he kicked a silly short pass no where near its target instead of a simple quick handpass outside him much earlier in the move.

Just bad decision making I think and probably thinks he needs to stand up and take these chances rather than looking around him.
Still, I think he's a handy man to have out around the MF where he can make a good mark from time to time and run from deep

Cavanagh, although not at his absolute best on Sunday, still is vital to this team. I believe that some teams think he is a bigger threat than he actually is these days and that will be crucial later in the championship as teams will use their best man marker on him or form a plan to stop him. I couldn't believe Mayo sacrificed Lee Keegan last year, Sean should have stood in full forward and not budged, completely neutralising Keegan's influence, but unforuntately Sean moved out the pitch and ultimately let Keegan dominate and wind him up.