Donegal v Kerry - 2025 All-Ireland Football Final

[u]

Cream of the crop always rises to the top.

[weareros]

Best team won. Donegal certainly made a game of it in 2nd half but just could not break out of their system and take some risks. Phenomenal game by Gavin White, still full of energy at the end. Kerry are just class footballers and have been great to watch all year. Tough however on an old warrior like Michael Murphy. Hard luck to Donegal and well done The Kingdom.

[thewobbler]

Talent vs obsessive manager with a system. Talent always wins

That's simply not true at all. Kerry have their own terrific coaching setup.

It's different though. Donegal steadfastly continue to play a system developed for the old rules.

Kerry mirrored that at times today, but their willingness to man mark one on one, and kick first, run second, provided the biggest separation between the teams today. Kerry can do tactical football, clearly. But Donegal only do tactical football.

[Lamh Dhearg Alba]

McGuinness not the genius everybody makes out. Kept with zonal marking, didn't pick up P Clifford but Kerry simply better players and alot better team. From what I see there, there's not a All-Ireland in that Donegal team.

He is a very good manager in that he rallied a disorganised mess of a squad going nowhere, galvanized them and made them one of the best sides in the game. They're still a bit short though and his tactics were off today as well.

Anti-climax of a final. Whenever Donegal threatened to get close they invariably made bad decisions when the chances were there to get it down to 3. I'm not convinced they ever had it in them to win anyway.

Unfortunate after a promising summer that we had 2 poor semis and poor final with a sanitised version of football. Plenty to ponder.

Congratulations to Kerry.

[oakleafgael]

McGuinness not the genius everybody makes out. Kept with zonal marking, didn't pick up P Clifford but Kerry simply better players and alot better team. From what I see there, there's not a All-Ireland in that Donegal team.

No there's not. Tyrone over the next few years probably the only team that will get close to Kerry.

Possibly, but will need to unearth a few more midfield options. The importance of it shown today.

[screenexile]

What comments did McGuinness make that people are taking exception to??

[grounded]

Kerry simply better. However a few killer blows with both Thompson and McHugh going off injured. I think Kerry would have still won but with less to spare.

[Captain Obvious]

Well done Kerry all to easy for them against a Donegal side not at the races and basically had that final lost after 20 minutes.

All knock out games either poor or one sided food for thought for those over the new rules and before they are locked in for a few years.

[OakLeaf]

Will Murphy go back into retirement now?

[Wildweasel74]

Had Clifford scored that goal it been really been a massacre on the scoreboard.

[thebigfullforward]

Gavin White, Paudie, Joe 0'Connor and David, that should be the potm order.

I'm rarely happy when Kerry win but to be honest, Jimmy's desperate attempts to ruin football, mean I can never sympathise with Donegal when he's involved. Skill and determination trumped tactics. That's a good thing for the game

Joe O'Connor been a better player than Paudie throughout the year

Yes, but for some reason, the MOTM award isn't supposed to take into account how you played in a league game in early March.

Read it as poty 🙈

[5times5times]

Back to the studio Murphy, or turkey.

Today was skill vs system.

And no brains to let PC have the running of the pitch and not be marked.

[screenexile]

Will Murphy go back into retirement now?

The gulf between both teams would make it hard for him to come back.

[tyrone08]

Late goal makes the scoreline look a bit more reflective of the game, Kerry way better and played it in 2nd gear for that 2nd half

Seen some talk in the build up of McGuiness potentially having something up his sleeve for this matchup, something he's been holding in reserve all year. Well that's just proven to be completely false. Did the same thing they've been doing all year, even when it wasn't working for them and they needed to try something different. Donegal are just so tied to this way of playing that they seem incapable of changing things up when they need to

💯 jim same as last time. System build on either being in front or close to opposition. Cant claw back big margins. Jim has a system and expects players to work into it rather than design a system to suit his talented players.

Reason why he failed at soccer 

[Wildweasel74]

He see out another year, played rightly this year, but he simply cant go 70mins, maybe Donegal see sense and use him last 25/30mins in a game. J O'Connor picking up a 5th All-Ireland.