Awesome Dublin turn on the power

IN fairness to the Hill, they showed a bit of decorum on Saturday.

It wasn’t until the last three minutes that they began to greet every Dublin pass with a cheer.

Had they wished, they could have done so with 15 minutes remaining and few would have batted an eyelid, such was the control exerted by the hosts.

On the sideline, Pat Gilroy could relax, safe in the knowledge that his team weren’t going to collapse.

Even though Tyrone scored the last three points, Dublin still won the second half 0-11 to 0-9.

Their tally after the break might have been 2-11 had Bernard Brogan been an inch or two closer to deflect a Paul Flynn shot to the net or brother Alan’s effort not clipped the post and gone wide.

Such was Dublin’s domination, they were searching for the coup de grace 10 minutes into the second half.

Given the intensity of training matches over the last four weeks, Gilroy wasn’t surprised by the result. He paid tribute to the other 19 players on the panel for keeping the starting team as sharp as they were.

In the end, it turned out to be an easier than expected win. “It probably was,” admitted the Dublin manager. “Tyrone are a very good team and we did look comfortable in that last 15 minutes. We should have had three goals but we won’t worry about missing them on a day like this. In the conditions it was excellent football from ourselves.”

Gilroy saw the performance for what it was — a riposte to a less than convincing Leinster final win over Wexford.

“We took a lot of stick after that and probably a lot was justified. There were a lot of people with points to prove.

“We have some excellent footballers and things did not click for them in the Leinster final and they did click today. But the key to that performance was the work rate. They had to work so hard to keep up with the B team for the last three weeks.”

If we didn’t know just how difficult Tyrone were going to have it after 20 minutes when they were hustled, harried and hurtled around by Dublin’s intensity, there were indications in the parade that all was not well with Mickey Harte’s side. Led by the great Philip Jordan and tailed by the mercurial Owen Mulligan, two men who left the panel this year disillusioned with the game, the optics didn’t exactly inspire.

Having been taken off early and scoreless in his last two SFC games, Diarmuid Connolly might have had reason to feel disenchanted. But here he was sublime. By half-time, he had scored five points. By the start of the second half, Conor Gormley was his third marker after Justin McMahon and Seán O’Neill had both failed to curtail him. Gormley only did marginally better as Connolly added another two to round off an amazing return to form.

“I think he had a reasonable game,” smiled Gilroy. “Diarmuid is capable of doing anything. He is a phenomenal talent. He is capable of doing even better than that.We have been waiting a while for that to come in a big game in Croke Park. He has done well in this year’s league and has committed himself hugely in terms of effort. Outside of the points he scored, his work-rate was phenomenal and that is a huge plus.”

Dublin’s 0-11 to 0-6 half-time lead also came courtesy of some brilliant all-round play from Flynn and Cian O’Sullivan in defence, who looked the part in the full-back line.

They had 16 fouls against them by then, and added another 20 afterwards as they showed no let-up in affording Tyrone a foothold to get into the game.

Based on his 2011 form, Alan Brogan had a quiet first half but was storming thereafter. Brother Bernard put his Leinster SFC woes behind him, notching four from play and crossing two terrific passes for Flynn and Barry Cahill scores between the 50th and 55th minutes.

Tyrone, primarily via Martin Penrose frees, were scoring more than they did in the first half but Dublin had an answer for all of them.

Substitute Stephen O’Neill collected a brace but when he cut himself a goal chance with 11 minutes to go he was overwhelmed by the speed of the Dublin cover to snuff him out.

There was just no way through for Tyrone.

So what now for Dublin? Gilroy sees no reason for discontinuing the intense A v B games, which served them so well for this quarter-final.

Tyrone mightn’t have gone with a sweeper until it was too late on Saturday but there’ll be no fear of Donegal not using one, or even two, on August 28.

“We have only done what Donegal did as well,” reminded Gilroy. “Donegal beat Tyrone. We haven’t even considered that game. The bottom line is for us, if we work hard we will get performances like that. If we drop that off at all then we can be rubbish.”

Scorers for Dublin: D Connolly 0-7; B Brogan 0-5 (1f); A Brogan 0-3; S Cluxton (1f, 1 45), P Flynn 0-2 each; B Cullen, D Bastick, B Cahill 0-1 each.

Scorers for Tyrone: S Cavanagh (3f), M Penrose (3f) 0-4 each; M Donnelly, Stephen O’Neill 0-2 each; P Harte (f), B Dooher, E McGinley 0-1 each.

Subs for Dublin: R McConnell for Macauley (59); K McManamon for Flynn (inj 66); E Fennell for Bastick (69); P McMahon for Nolan (inj 71).

Subs for Tyrone: D Carlin for Justin McMahon, B Dooher for B McGuigan (both h-t); Stephen O’Neill for Harte (43); E McGinley for Hughes, A Cassidy for C Cavanagh (both 53).

Referee: Joe McQuillan (Cavan).