Donegal V Tyrone Ulster Final 17th July

[Aaron Boone]

A lot of very confident sounding Tyrone posters giving their judgement but it is hard to escape the feeling that there is a whiff of whistling past the graveyard about it all.

I think Tyrone have seen the 'easier' patheay to the AI-final, but have forgotten there's an Ulster final to play against their bogey team.

[Redhand Santa]

I'd agree that there probably is an over confidence among an element of the Tyrone support, many of whom would have been calling for harte's head last year. Most supporters would recognise though that Donegal are a huge obstacle as we've learned only top well in recent years.

I personally believe we've improved a lot from last year but we'll only know for definite come Sunday. I'm sure based on recent years, some good players coming in and their ulster record many Donegal fans will be very confident of victory.

[omagh_gael]

We started out the replay with:

Morgan
McCrory
McNamee
McCarron
McCann
Justy
McNabb
Matty
Colm
Harte
Sludden
McShane
O'Neill
Sean
McAliskey

Can't see any changes to this team. Did any of the subs do enough to force a starting place? Brennan, maybe, but who do you leave out?

[ONeill]

Ah 1989, what a year. Got the curt at Loch an Iuir. She wasn't deadly though. Conway and his point from 60m. Probably a lot less but seemed like that then from my height. Remember very little about the drawn game apart from that.

Vivid memories of the replay. Unfinished business. Plunkett, O'Hagan, KcKenna appeared like giants. The Prince at corner forward that year I think. Joe Mallon the Mexican and McGarvey and Skelton keeping out the goals. Looked unbeatable.

Then Mayo.

[BennyHarp]

A lot of very confident sounding Tyrone posters giving their judgement but it is hard to escape the feeling that there is a whiff of whistling past the graveyard about it all.

I think Tyrone have seen the 'easier' patheay to the AI-final, but have forgotten there's an Ulster final to play against their bogey team.

Bogey team? The most lazy of all comments. Donegal where just better than Tyrone in years gone by and much more developed as a team and in their gameplan. I think there is a sense in Tyrone that we have been building towards a decent team for a few years. A couple of AI semi final places and a U21 AI has given us something tangible to base our optimism on. Last year in Ballybofey there a real sense that the gap was closing against Donegal and watching them perform so ineptly against Mayo in Croker after our game against Monaghan just felt like watching a team in decline. I have huge respect for Donegal, but they have as many questions to answer as Tyrone. They have emerged again in Ulster looking good but it was the same last year early in the championship, remember how they were talked up after the Armagh game but then fizzled out after that? Was the form line for their victory over Monaghan called into question after Longfords win? Has Rory Gallagher proven himself to be capable of operating at this level? If Donegal win then fair play, it will be because they are a better team, but not because they are Tyrone's bogeymen!

[rrhf]

Donegal have more to lose if they lose this Ulster Final but Tyrone have more to gain if they win..

[J70]

I don't see what relevance Longford beating Monaghan has at all to this game or Donegal in general. Sure Down took Longford to extra time and Monaghan absolutely destroyed Down. Offaly hammered Longford by nine or ten points. Is anyone suggesting Offaly would hammer Monaghan? If so, is the Leinster championship suddenly a decent standard? Is so, where does that leave Derry and Meath? Was the Ulster draw hopelessly lopsided this year, with Donegal emerging from the desperately poor half. And if that is so, where does that leave Mayo who just about scraped past Fermanagh who were fairly handily dealt with by Donegal?

[Knock Yer Mucker In]

We started out the replay with:

Morgan
McCrory
McNamee
McCarron
McCann
Justy
McNabb
Matty
Colm
Harte
Sludden
McShane
O'Neill
Sean
McAliskey

Can't see any changes to this team. Did any of the subs do enough to force a starting place? Brennan, maybe, but who do you leave out?

O Neill is still a better keeper than Morgan, he made one mistake v Cavan and Harte showed him no loyalty. Morgan bottled it last years semi final and can't be trusted. For all the talk from some Tyrone supporters about the third goal that got Cavn the draw, why wasn't the same analysis applied of the last goal Cavn got in the replay, a decent keeper would have stopped it, because it wasn't tight so therefore not a mention of it. O Neill is more reliable.

[BennyHarp]

I don't see what relevance Longford beating Monaghan has at all to this game or Donegal in general. Sure Down took Longford to extra time and Monaghan absolutely destroyed Down. Offaly hammered Longford by nine or ten points. Is anyone suggesting Offaly would hammer Monaghan? If so, is the Leinster championship suddenly a decent standard? Is so, where does that leave Derry and Meath? Was the Ulster draw hopelessly lopsided this year, with Donegal emerging from the desperately poor half. And if that is so, where does that leave Mayo who just about scraped past Fermanagh who were fairly handily dealt with by Donegal?

It has as much relevance as saying Donegal are Tyrone's bogey team because they beat them 3-4 years ago. The win over Monaghan looked very positive for Donegal but perhaps Monaghan are on a downward spiral themselves. As a Tyrone man, I wouldn't be drawing too much confidence in that particular point myself but I was just making the point that their form hadn't really been franked by Monaghan's subsequent performance. Id just put a little question mark over the form like you would do picking a horse at cheltenham! 😜

[ONeill]

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=t94NNOP0Xcs

[omagh_gael]

We started out the replay with:

Morgan
McCrory
McNamee
McCarron
McCann
Justy
McNabb
Matty
Colm
Harte
Sludden
McShane
O'Neill
Sean
McAliskey

Can't see any changes to this team. Did any of the subs do enough to force a starting place? Brennan, maybe, but who do you leave out?

O Neill is still a better keeper than Morgan, he made one mistake v Cavan and Harte showed him no loyalty. Morgan bottled it last years semi final and can't be trusted. For all the talk from some Tyrone supporters about the third goal that got Cavn the draw, why wasn't the same analysis applied of the last goal Cavn got in the replay, a decent keeper would have stopped it, because it wasn't tight so therefore not a mention of it. O Neill is more reliable.

The keeper set up is very like the 2000s when we never really had a number one, rather it was more or less shared between Pascal and John.

I think it will be the same for Niall and Mickey in that neither is significantly ahead of the other so one bad game and you're out until the next man has a bad day. Morgan has the free kicking (albeit very hit and miss himself) in his favour as this issue has reared it's ugly head again recently.

Think you're being a bit harsh on Niall re Cavan's last goal the other week as Brady hit a thunderbolt that would have been incredibly difficult to stop. Kind of like Murphy's goal in the opening minutes of the AI final in 2012.

[Knock Yer Mucker In]

Don't think so, any goal keeping coach would say that Morgan has a habit, as in the goal we are referring to as being down on his knees before the ball, and he would have been coached to stay on his feet, the ball would have hit him if he had of stayed on his feet. He is not a natural keeper.

[redzone]

Majority of the players prefer Morgan, so I'm led to believe. Both great keepers, lucky to have them

[Fuzzman]

I think Morgan is considered No 1 but O'Neill got his chance this year as Morgan was out injured for a while.
O'Neill's decision to come off his line to punch for the 3rd goal v Cavan was enough to see him lose his place.
Morgan seems more accurate and confident with his kicking whereas O'Neill is a little hit and miss at times but he has got better.

Article from Declan Bogue today. Interesting what McGuinness said about Sean Cavanagh and winning frees.

Tyrone must do it the Donegal way
Who were the two men celebrating on the pitch when Tyrone beat Monaghan to win the Ulster title in 2010? Nobody quite knows, but those figures have become part of the narrative surrounding Tyrone's jaded relationship with the Anglo Celt Cup at that time.


Perhaps it was 'The Midnight Callers', the pair of lads who once called Mickey Harte's house phone to criticise his tactics and team selections in his first year in charge of the Red Hands. Rather than hang up, Harte built a relationship with the anonymous duo and an unlikely relationship began.

In the aftermath and amid the emotion of that win on the Croke Park pitch, Harte felt a tap on his shoulder - it was 'The Midnight Callers' offering their congratulations. It was a heady time and while a lot of people enjoyed a lot of success, it was inevitable that it would be taken for granted.

A captain from either Armagh or Tyrone raised the Cup for 12 consecutive years. Somewhere in the middle, it became a mere point of reference - a step on the road towards greater glory.

Raising the silverware briefly above your head with your face held in a grimace became the etiquette. Quickly patronise the losers, thank the management and backroom team, drop the microphone with a thud and get back up the road with the trophy hidden from sight.

Jim McGuinness changed that.

Whenever the final whistle went in the 2011 final, the then Donegal boss ran into the middle of the pitch and embraced his players.

The scenes were repeated the following year when the Donegal support truly began to mobilise after that paltry Ulster final attendance of the previous year.

In 2014, a year after losing the provincial crown to Monaghan and Malachy O'Rourke, there was no post-match handshake as McGuinness ran straight across their path, whooping and punching the air. By accident or design? Who knows.

But he made your own province something worth treasuring again. When the Donegal team bus would eventually snake its way to the Diamond of Donegal town, the now county Chairman Sean Dunnion would act as Master of Ceremonies. McGuinness would then deliver an impassioned speech.

And then each and every member of the playing, management and backroom teams were introduced on the stage, right down to the kitmen and bus drivers.

But then again, McGuinness changed everything.

To change everything, he had to innovate. But what is innovation? Taking what you see and adapting it to your requirements.

So he studied Tyrone's principles. He took the 'swarm tackle' and turned it into the 'blanket defence'. Donegal would defend in numbers - but in their own half - wearing down teams before bounding forward in counter-attacks that sucked the legs and morale out of the opposition.

Videos of Sean Cavanagh 'buying' frees were shown to Donegal players. They were told to learn from it.

Mentally, Donegal and Tyrone were at opposite ends of the scale with their complexes. When Tyrone were awarded a free, they had a number of players who would shout in the faces of the opposition. It could crush a man's spirit.

So when Donegal met Tyrone in the Ulster semi-final of 2011, McGuinness coated his players with an armour. They were to say 'not today' to their opponents when they tried to get inside their minds. They scraped through that afternoon, after briefly threatening to go under in the first-half.

In the Ulster final this Sunday, it will be the Tyrone players who have to say 'not today' to their more celebrated, successful opponents. Only five current Red Hands aces have an Ulster medal. Now, it's Tyrone who have the inferiority complex. Donegal have moulded their opponents by defeating them.

Take Mattie Donnelly for example. He is one of the finest players in the game, but his Championship debut was the 2012 defeat to Donegal. Before this season, he had won just two games in Ulster.

That's why to this mind, the favourites tag granted to Tyrone is a false reading. Up against Donegal in isolation, the gap between the duo has grown wider with the Red Hands losing to their rivals four times in the past five years.

Working in Omagh the day after Tyrone beat Monaghan in the 2010 final, my then boss expressed his amazement at how low-key everything was, recalling a time when an Anglo Celt would prompt days of celebration.

Should Donegal win, they will mark it in their now time-honoured fashion. If Tyrone manage to overturn the hold their neighbours have on them, the entire county will be filing a sicknote on Monday.

[God14]

Majority of the players prefer Morgan, so I'm led to believe. Both great keepers, lucky to have them

He has the edge on restarts (ignoring last years AI semi final)