Tyrone left licking wounds as classy Donegal prevail

Donegal 0-14

Tyrone 0-21

By Niall Gartland

A CHASTENING enough experience, truth be told. In the lead up to Saturday night’s group stage opener against Donegal in Ballybofey, the mood music in Tyrone had been fairly positive.

We’d brought Donegal to the brink in an Ulster Championship semi-final, we’d a neat four-week gap to recalibrate to that extra-time defeat, lads were coming back from injury and last weekend’s All-Ireland U20 final triumph served as a timely reminder that there’s talent waiting in the wings and plenty of it.

So Tyrone fans – the ones in my circle anyway – were reasonably hopeful of the county’s chances of pulling off an upset in Ballybofey, but it didn’t quite work out like that. Now the best that can be reasonably hoped for is the inconvenience of an All-Ireland Preliminary Quarter-final in a month’s time.

The first thing that has to be said is that Donegal were absolutely lethal. They gave a masterclass in modern attacking play – everything they did seemed to have a purpose, defensively they’re a well-oiled machine and their energy levels were off the charts as they rolled through the gears in the second-half with the wind at their backs.

And it’s fair to say that the buzz is back. En route to Ballybofey, you couldn’t move for Donegal flags, the stands were thronged with home supporters and there was the expected pitch invasion after the match. The players didn’t hang around to sign jerseys and what not – they made a bee-line for the tunnel, leaving local legend and GAAGO pundit Michael Murphy the focal point for expectant Donegal supporters. No doubt, Jim McGuinness and his team have bigger fish to fry and on the evidence of Saturday night, they’re now bona fide contenders for the All-Ireland.

For Tyrone, it was a humbling enough day at the office. The first-half was more or less grand but they lived dangerously at times. They coughed up two goal chances in the first ten minutes – and indeed, the only thing preventing this from being the complete perspective from a Donegal perspective was their inability to conjure up a three-pointer on the day.

The Red Hands nabbed the first two scores of the day – a free from Darragh Canavan and a peach of a point from Darren McCurry, operating in a slightly less advanced role than usual, a clever manoeuvre that meant he picked up plenty of possession. He was forced onto his ‘weaker’ right foot but still managed to split the posts from an unforgiving angle.

Donegal, showing no hangover from their recent Ulster final win, picked off four points on the spin, their interplay hugely impressive – no playing pass the parcel for the sake of it – and displaying a wide array of attacking threats with 10 Donegal players getting their name on the scoreboard by the day’s end.

McCurry responded for Tyrone, his second and final point from play of the day, and Donegal moved into a 0-6 to 0-3 lead with points from late inclusion Eoghan Ban Gallagher and Paddy McBrearty.

Their hard running was posing Tyrone plenty of problems, they were keeping the ball out of contact and they were manufacturing scores, but Tyrone were shaping up reasonably well and they almost scored one of the goals of the championship when Darragh Canavan’s screamer blazed left off the target after a sweeping team move sparked when Padraig Hampsey deprived Paddy McBrearty off possession.

Mattie Donnelly’s battling qualities and willingness to drive hard at the defence were evident throughout, and he fisted over a score after exchanging passes with McCurry. Another of the plus points from a Tyrone perspective was the performance of Kieran McGeary. He kicked two points in succession, and added a third from play after the break.

The points came thick and fast and Donegal could count themselves fortunate to win a close-range free when Niall Morgan was deemed to have touched the ball on the ground after an astonishing fetch at the back. Later in proceedings, a similar scenario arose when Morgan rose high to gather the ball like his life depended on it, referee Joe McQuillan seemingly unwilling to give the Edendork goalkeeper the benefit of the doubt for whatever reason.

Come the half-time whistle, the scoreboard read 0-10 to 0-9 in Donegal’s favour but the signs were already there. Take their last score of the half – corner-back Ciarán Moore applied the afterburners and could’ve gone for goal had the mood taken him, but he slipped it across to Oisin Gallen who clipped over their tenth point of the day.

Ryan McHugh got the show on the road again for Donegal in the 38th minute, swinging a boot at it while under severe enough pressure, and they extended their advantage when Oisin Gallen tagged on a free.

Tyrone mustered a free in response, a beauty from Niall Morgan, but the real story of the point was Darragh Canavan out-jumping and out-foxing Caolan McGonagle to win the free in the first place.

But they couldn’t rely on pieces of magic to down the good ship Donegal, and they trailed by 0-15 to 0-11 with 20 minutes remaining following a brace of cleverly constructed scores from midfielder Jason McGee (a man mountain of a fella) and half-back Peadar Mogan (probably about a foot shorter but perfectly durable and a complete speed machine).

Tyrone rang the changes with Cathal McShane, making his 100th appearance, entering the fray for McCurry and skipper Peter Harte returning from injury to come in for Kilpatrick. They kept plugging away with points from Niall Devlin and McGeary, while Brian Kennedy was doing his level best and made a couple of stellar defensive contributions.

As the clock ticked into the final 10 minutes, there were only three points between the teams but it felt like more. Tyrone’s attacks were coming to nought; by contrast Donegal scored four of the last five points of the game. Peadar Mogan was heavily involved as score-maker and score-getter, sub Odhran Doherty scored a clinker with the outside of his boot and Michael Langan drove over their final score deep into injury time. Tyrone could have no complaints – Donegal were excellent and that’s just that.