Jim Gavin has maintained that the likes of Bernard Brogan, Rory O’Carroll, and Eoghan O’Gara all have fighting chances of making Dublin’s All-Ireland final match panel.

The tepid showing of Jim Gavin’s second string in Sunday’s Super 8 win over Tyrone has ‘demystified Dublin’, says former Armagh star Tony McEntee.

And with that, the Super 8 became the final four with the remaining quartet arguably the best in the country.

Diarmuid Connolly’s first Championship start for Dublin in 26 months was marked with a win as Dublin confirmed their All-Ireland semi-final against Mayo this Saturday.

Paul ‘Pillar’ Caffrey, the man who handed Diarmuid Connolly his Championship debut, has admitted the forward’s mid-summer recall was “bizarre, a circus, unreal, a surprise”.

If Meath’s Michael Newman had swapped jerseys with Niall Scully before the start of yesterday’s Leinster final, then all six starting Dublin forwards would have been on the scoresheet.

Tyrone great Sean Cavanagh has claimed Tiernan McCann has a reputation locally for being “too nice” and that he’ll be “gutted” with his two-match ban.

Just one Munster man — Cork GAA CEO Kevin O’Donovan — is involved in the new fixtures task force (four from Leinster, three each from Connacht and Ulster) but at least there are several members hailing from dual counties.

Not for the first time, Gavin referred to a specific question in a general sense but is not ruling anything in or out for the St Vincent’s man.

Dean Rock and Cillian O’Connor will both have similar feelings this morning.

This evening in Portlaoise, we get the first indications if Dublin have ironed out their spring creases - or if there is genuine hope for the chasing pack

James McCarthy has rejected the suggestion Dublin’s full-back line is a potential area of weakness as they set about their bid for history and the five-in-a-row.

Longing — wrote Don DeLilo in his opus Underworld — on a large scale, makes history.

Kieran Donaghy has challenged Kerry to stand up when it truly counts in the Championship and to prove their credentials by delivering in a major game.

Former Dublin hurling manager Anthony Daly has not ruled out an inter-county recall for Rory O’Carroll — for the Dublin footballers.

Defending champions Kilmacud Crokes began their Dublin SFC campaign on a positive note when defeating Ballymun Kickhams by 2-13 to 0-14 at Parnell Park on Saturday night.

Diarmuid Connolly will find the door to Dublin’s dressing-room remains wide open when he returns to Ireland in the coming weeks.

AT the halfway point of the decade, I selected the players who were best positioned to make any all-decade side.

Last January’s Allianz National Football League encounter between Dublin and Kerry provided a gutcheck in more ways than one for Paul Mannion.

Former All-Ireland winning Dublin manager Dr Pat O’Neill has assured the GAA community that incidences of concussion are still relatively rare and shouldn’t be ‘over hyped’.

Here’s a briefing on some of the stories and issues highlighted on irishexaminer.com today

Philly McMahon isn’t interested in winning friends but he certainly influences people.

Experienced inter-county manager Tomás Ó Flatharta predicts his native Kerry will pull a rabbit from the hat and bring “something special” to their clash with Dublin.

Barry Cahill spent enough time with Rory Gallagher on the Old Navan Road during the 2000s to know he has something planned for Dublin on Saturday.

Back in mid-spring, canny punters felt they’d pulled off a rare coup by tying bookmakers to 66/1 odds on Dublin’s James McCarthy being named Footballer of the Year.

The Red Hands are battle-hardened, writes Paul Keane.

Dublin 2-19 Westmeath 0-10: Same as it ever was, then. An 11th Leinster title in 12 seasons for Dublin, another lopsided scoreline and a renewed bout of hand-wringing as to what the rest of the province – and everyone else – can possibly do to reduce a gap that shows no sign of closing anytime soon.

Jim Gavin has challenged his Dublin defenders to put some “resilience” into their game after being opened up for two goals by Laois.

The Leinster Council’s decision to choose Nowlan Park as the venue for Dublin’s opening defence of their provincial title may have come from left-field, but the Kilkenny ground will not be virgin territory for all of Jim Gavin’s footballers.

You could feel it building around Kerry all last week. A sort of guarded sense of hope. Nothing cocky - how could you be against your chief tormentors of recent years? But the optimism of a solid league campaign had started to seep its way into Kerry’s consciousness.

Jim Gavin doesn’t do hyperbole, particularly not when it comes to his Dublin team’s increasingly remarkable achievements, so a statement of serious All-Ireland intent was perhaps asking a little too much.