Cassidy refuses to use absentees as an excuse

FAIR play to Damian Cassidy.

The Derry manager could have taken the easy way out. He could have pointed to the absence of so many key players and held his hands up in a gesture of helplessness. One reporter virtually put those very words in his mouth but he didn’t bite.

“I can turn around and throw that stuff out but that would be paying serious disrespect to the people who were out there,” Cassidy responded. “We had 15 fellows who went out there today and they tried to play the game we wanted to play and you can’t just disrespect those players’ efforts.”

Admirable certainly, but the loss of men like Fergal Doherty, Fergal McCusker, Enda Muldoon and James Kielt can’t simply be waved away when dissecting Derry’s disappointing display.

The extent of the defeat will rankle as much as the result. Eight points. A bad loss on any given Sunday but the type of scoreline that haunts a man’s thoughts when inflicted by a neighbour and bitter rival.

And to think that they kept Stephen O’Neill and Seán Cavanagh to one point each while Owen Mulligan was reeled ashore after only 45 minutes so Brian Dooher could make his grand entrance.

Derry ultimately had too few fingers and too many holes in the dyke. It was Tommy McGuigan and Martin Penrose who proved Tyrone’s match-winners. Their seven points ensured their full-forward line’s difficulties were disappointing rather than mortal.

“That’s the strength of Tyrone and that’s where the credit has to lie,” said Cassidy. “It’s a team performance and you have to get your scores from around the team. Anyone that thinks you can go out and beat Tyrone by marking two or three players is living in another planet. They have a strong team and they have a range of options and scorers.”

A similar scenario played itself out at the other end of the pitch. The maxim goes that if you stop Paddy Bradley you stop Derry and Mickey Harte devised a plan to do just that.

Conor Gormley or Ryan McMenamin were expected to be detailed onto Derry’s main threat but instead it was Justin McMahon who moved from centre-back to do so.

McMahon’s success in the role was a large part of the reason why Tyrone were already on the way to victory by the time Kevin McGuckin saw red nine minutes from full time.

“We probably should have been further ahead earlier in the game,” said Harte. “Tommy (McGuigan) had that goal chance early in the second half which would have given us a good comfort zone but that didn’t happen.

“I am also very conscious that this wasn’t a full Derry team that we played today and they still have a lot of good players to come back. They will be around a lot later in the summer just yet.”