What makes Benny Coulter so special
This was based on their narrow loss to Armagh in the Division 2 League final whereas Donegal had lost heavily to Armagh in the concluding round of the league when they had all to play for.
And so it proved, eventually.
Down won because they are the better team and yesterday, had the game’s outstanding player in Benny Coulter.
Indeed, Benny has been Down’s best player for a decade and yesterday, in the absence of the injured Ambrose Rogers, was the team captain. He showed great leadership all through, winning his early duel with no less a player than Karl Lacey, before going on to kick two very important points in the second half, at a time when Down were struggling for scores despite an abundance of possession.
He also won three kick-outs in the second half when moved out to the half-forward line and still got himself on the end of the move to cooly score the all-important goal in the second half of extra-time. This score effectively won the game for Down. He finished the day with a goal and four points from play and at the final whistle was to be found winning a vital ball in the heart of his own defence. Great desire and will to win from a great player.
He had good support up front from Mark Poland, the hard-working and accurate Danny Hughes and the returned Martin Clarke. Martin had a good outing and will improve with every game. Not everything went right for him yesterday but he kicked important scores in both halves from acute angles, played some nice foot passes and showed good composure to kick a booming ‘45 with three minutes to go in normal time, to put Down ahead. Most importantly, he is a big-name that people are talking about and will take watching, and this takes a lot of pressure off Coulter.
Down have two big men in midfield who won’t be dwarfed by any opposition. They shaded the kick-outs, winning 26 to Donegal’s 22. It was not a day of high-fielding but honourable mention to Kevin Cassidy, Kalum King and Benny Coulter for sharing eight high catches between them.
Down employed James Colgan as a sweeper in front of Michael Murphy and it was successful in curbing his considerable threat. If you are going to use a long ball to a big target man, it needs to be fast ball, but Donegal were very slow to get the ball in. I also felt Donegal had no threat in their half-forward line so that they could vary the ball going in and force the sweeper to play further out the field. I was surprised Donegal did not run at Down more effectively and use the free man that they had out the field.
In fairness to Michael Murphy, he did not have the support enjoyed by Benny Coulter and he did well to win the ball to set up Dermot Molloy for his goal. I thought Donegal could have put a bit more hang-time on some of the long balls they played in because Murphy had a height advantage over the Down defenders. It is very difficult to be effective when you have two defenders for company and you probably need to work very hard making one, two or three runs to make yourself some space. Murphy reminds me of Wayne Rooney in that both were fully-grown men in their late teens and this physical advantage allows them to be very influential on their teams while still young.
It will be interesting to watch their careers and see if they find it hard to keep their fitness in their late twenties, whether they improve as they get older or whether their early twenties are to be their peak-years.
Down will improve from this performance but will be concerned that after a promising opening half, their performance dropped and it took them until the 67th minute when Benny Coulter kicked the equaliser to reel-in a below-par Donegal. Special mention must go to Donegal goalkeeper, Paul Durkan, for a save from a Dan Gordon flick near the end of normal time that wont be bettered in the World Cup finals in South Africa.
I actually think the hand-pass rule is beginning to work. The players seemed to be making a genuine effort to perform a proper fist-pass. Joe McQuillan had a good game but did allow a few dodgy hand-passes. I think if the referees continue their clamp-down then very soon the handpass will cease to become an issue.
