Donegal v Dublin AISF 31st Aug 2014

[Jinxy]

Dare I say Dublin badly missed Ger Brennan today?

[Syferus]

Dare I say Dublin badly missed Ger Brennan today?

What good would getting a man sent off do them?

[Mike Sheehy]

Donegal were very impressive. Even more so because I think Dublin played well for most of the game. Connolly was excellent as was MDMA. Kamikze defending in the second half though. It looks like they had a deliberate policy to push up against Donegal instead of falling back when they lost possession. Anytime Donegal managed to get past halfway in that scenario a goal was on and they were fairly clinical in taking advantage. That Ryan McHugh will take some watching. McFaddens confidence will also be sky high now which is bad news for us. I fear for our fullback line against him and Murphy.

We had a full court press for the whole game Mike. In other words we pushed up everywhere on their kickouts. Which is fine when you're winning the kick-outs but a disaster when you don't

Dublin's weakness has always been midfield and today it was exposed. Dublin needed to win ugly today and didn't do it as we've only played the one style of football for two years.

I'm not going to start hammering the management over one game. It was  a bad game to lose but that's sport. W

I was referring more to when Dublin were attacking themselves and they got turned over rather than on Donegals  kickouts. I actually thought midfield was reasonably even. Donegal definitely were on top in the second half but Dublin still won a fair amount of possession. It was losing possession in the Donegal half,  and Dublins response to that turnover, that killed them. 

[Rossfan]

Great win by Donegal which seemed highly unlikely 15/20 mins in. But once they started taking the game to Dublin they fairly took them to the cleaners.
Dublin missed some howlers at vital stages of the second half. All those soft games this year were of little use to them.
Some great football and excitement last 2 weekends.
Hurley crowd take note 

[INDIANA]

Donegal were very impressive. Even more so because I think Dublin played well for most of the game. Connolly was excellent as was MDMA. Kamikze defending in the second half though. It looks like they had a deliberate policy to push up against Donegal instead of falling back when they lost possession. Anytime Donegal managed to get past halfway in that scenario a goal was on and they were fairly clinical in taking advantage. That Ryan McHugh will take some watching. McFaddens confidence will also be sky high now which is bad news for us. I fear for our fullback line against him and Murphy.

We had a full court press for the whole game Mike. In other words we pushed up everywhere on their kickouts. Which is fine when you're winning the kick-outs but a disaster when you don't

Dublin's weakness has always been midfield and today it was exposed. Dublin needed to win ugly today and didn't do it as we've only played the one style of football for two years.

I'm not going to start hammering the management over one game. It was  a bad game to lose but that's sport. W

I was referring more to when Dublin were attacking themselves and they got turned over rather than on Donegals  kickouts. I actually thought midfield was reasonably even. Donegal definitely were on top in the second half but Dublin still won a fair amount of possession. It was losing possession in the Donegal half,  and Dublins response to that turnover, that killed them.

We got turned over as we kept playing silly 5 yard handpasses into a condensed area.

When we got ahead we should have just played them at their own game and won ugly. I've no doubt had we dropped 13 men behind the ball after 20 minutes we'd have won. But we didn't and we gave them a foothold and they played their counter attacking football which they are excellent at. And once they got ahead we were finished. But you won't see the 2nd and 3rd goals today in a junior B game- they were that poor in terms of the defending for them

Plus they controlled the tempo of the game. But we looked tired today. I think back to back is near impossible in the modern era.  It's no harm anyway I'm tired of having to spend my days defending our position which is seen as unfair by everyone else.

[Dinny Breen]

Dublin's forwards are not clinical need to create lots of opportunities to score so I must commend Donegal on their composure after the opening 15mins when it looked Dublin couldn't miss, they simply didn't panic and worked their way into the game. The contrast to Dublin in the last 15 was stark when they completely lost their composure  instead of lads like MDMA Brogan and McMenimen providing situational leadership they just hit bad wide after bad wide, to me Dublin were a team not prepared to go to the end mentally.

[Wildweasel74]

All this and "Dont Matter" aint to be seen!!

[J70]

Still hasn't sunk in what we just witnessed in that match! Like everyone else, I didn't give us a chance, merely hoping that we'd keep it tight and run them close, such was the hype surrounding this supposedly invincible Dublin line-up. And for the first 15 or so minutes, it looked like the unanimous predictions (Tony McEntee the honourable exception in saying we COULD win!) were coming true. Slowly, but surely, however, around that point Dublin's forwards started to run into traffic and we started to absorb their attacks, Connolly's goal chance notwithstanding. Then McGuinness called Walsh ashore and sent on Toye and we started to push a few men up to support the attack and suddenly we found that this Dublin defence would actually give up chances to us if we got men running in support. Murphy, after missing an easy chance into Cluxton's arms, straight away sent over a great score, and we were only two points down after being pummeled in the first 15. Next thing McHugh gets the goal, and suddenly it seems like we might be in with a shout! The start of the second half was just incredible, with Alan Brogan and McFadden swapping bad misses, before McHugh's second goal put us five points up. It seems like a goal was on, after that, every time we went forward, with the Dublin defence at sixes and sevens and stretched all over the place. Once McFadden walked in his goal, it was game over as long as we didn't concede one ourselves, and except for McMenamin's toe-poke effort, which was too late anyway, Dublin never looked like grabbing one. Of course, you always worry about Dublin reeling you in like they did Mayo two years ago, but they seemed intent on trying to get a goal chance from more than ten minutes out, and then seemed to completely lose their composure, hitting some very poor wides. At the other end, McBrearty and McHugh kept knocking over a few to keep the gap widened and we were pretty much home and hosed!

Absolute genius by McGuinness, although I would also say that the people who claim that Donegal have a lot of average players would need to cop themselves on. You don't win three out of four Ulster titles and get to two out of three All Ireland finals, winning at least one, with average players, no matter how effective your tactical set up and coaching/management. We've beaten the supposedly unbeatable Dubs, possibly a side who will ultimately rank among the best ever, and thoroughly deserved out victory, and you don't do that with average players. In terms of Donegal performances, that one today may surpass the 1992 final and the 2012 semi against Cork.

Looking forward to the final against a very impressive and courageous Kerry team. This one is going to be hard to call (unlike the semis!) 

[squire_in_navy_slacks]

Dublin's forwards are not clinical need to create lots of opportunities to score so I must commend Donegal on their composure after the opening 15mins when it looked Dublin couldn't miss, they simply didn't panic and worked their way into the game. The contrast to Dublin in the last 15 was stark when they completely lost their composure  instead of lads like MDMA Brogan and McMenimen providing situational leadership they just hit bad wide after bad wide, to me Dublin were a team not prepared to go to the end mentally.

Indeed, a bit like the Kildare lads 

[INDIANA]

Dublin's forwards are not clinical need to create lots of opportunities to score so I must commend Donegal on their composure after the opening 15mins when it looked Dublin couldn't miss, they simply didn't panic and worked their way into the game. The contrast to Dublin in the last 15 was stark when they completely lost their composure  instead of lads like MDMA Brogan and McMenimen providing situational leadership they just hit bad wide after bad wide, to me Dublin were a team not prepared to go to the end mentally.

Indeed, a bit like the Kildare lads 

Got to be the ultimate in irony. Our half forwards got 0-10 between them. Not bad for forwards with no composure.

A tactical malfunction ensured our forwards had to go for goals in the latter stages when most of those wides occured.

i see Ewan Mc Kenna spouting more of his anti-Dubs bile on twitter- Classy guy is our Ewan. One lad who'd you'd be happy to see out of work and redundant.

[squire_in_navy_slacks]

Dublin's forwards are not clinical need to create lots of opportunities to score so I must commend Donegal on their composure after the opening 15mins when it looked Dublin couldn't miss, they simply didn't panic and worked their way into the game. The contrast to Dublin in the last 15 was stark when they completely lost their composure  instead of lads like MDMA Brogan and McMenimen providing situational leadership they just hit bad wide after bad wide, to me Dublin were a team not prepared to go to the end mentally.

Indeed, a bit like the Kildare lads 

Got to be the ultimate in irony. Our half forwards got 0-10 between them. Not bad for forwards with no composure.

A tactical malfunction ensured our forwards had to go for goals in the latter stages when most of those wides occured.

i see Ewan Mc Kenna spouting more of his anti-Dubs bile on twitter- Classy guy is our Ewan. One lad who'd you'd be happy to see out of work and redundant.

A roundy soft jowled oaf of a being

[laoislad]

That cigar on All Ireland night will have to wait till next year INDIANA....

[The Hill is Blue]

Well done Donegal – yours was a devastating second-half display and a well-deserved victory. We owned the first twenty minutes and if any of our three goal chances had gone in the story might have been different, but it was not to be.

It's not a good feeling for a Dubs supporter tonight and it will take us a few days to get over this, but we've had nights like this before and we'll rise again. This Dublin squad has given us many great days over the past three or four years and hopefully we'll have a few more. They are a brilliant bunch of lads and they owe the supporters nothing. Well done lads.

To the Donegal supporters – enjoy the next few weeks. Your team did you proud.

[Wildweasel74]

well my Brother must thought they would win or just  the old gambler i think he is, had £20 on Donegal at 7-1, these 10-1 odds talked about must been down round Dublin somewhere

[Syferus]

Dublin's forwards are not clinical need to create lots of opportunities to score so I must commend Donegal on their composure after the opening 15mins when it looked Dublin couldn't miss, they simply didn't panic and worked their way into the game. The contrast to Dublin in the last 15 was stark when they completely lost their composure  instead of lads like MDMA Brogan and McMenimen providing situational leadership they just hit bad wide after bad wide, to me Dublin were a team not prepared to go to the end mentally.

Indeed, a bit like the Kildare lads 

Got to be the ultimate in irony. Our half forwards got 0-10 between them. Not bad for forwards with no composure.

A tactical malfunction ensured our forwards had to go for goals in the latter stages when most of those wides occured.

i see Ewan Mc Kenna spouting more of his anti-Dubs bile on twitter- Classy guy is our Ewan. One lad who'd you'd be happy to see out of work and redundant.

Sure he wrote Kenny Egan's autobiography, how anti-Dub can he be?