Donegal’s defence set for tough test
WHEN Donegal won their only All-Ireland in 1992 they persisted with a tactic that annoyed most of the rest of the country. Ditto this time out. In 1992 they liked to play a possession game which was littered with short hand passes and little kicking. This time round Jimmy McGuinness has developed a very effective defensive system that has only been bettered once this year, in a dead league game when they were already qualified for a league final.
Donegal have been playing like this for the last couple of years but McGuinness has tweaked, tightened and improved the system. While analysing Cork prior to the 2009 final, we noticed an unusual aspect to Donegal’s defensive set-up in that year’s quarter-final against the Rebel. Donegal then, as now, liked to get a lot of bodies behind the ball. We had one video clip with 12 Donegal men inside their own 45m line. The crucial difference was that in 2009 they were marking space rather than engaging the Cork forwards, who repeatedly punched holes in the Donegal rearguard.
McGuinness has changed this. The players nearest the ball are expected to hunt the man in possession in groups, hounding them into over-carrying or a turnover. They also like to get men back quicker. Donegal players often turn their backs on the ball once they lose possession and sprint back to their defensive positions to stand sentinel. It may not be pretty but it has been effective thus far.
DUBLIN are well equipped to break down Donegal. The Dubs will first of all try to move the ball fast, preferably by kicking it as they did against Tyrone, and get the Brogans and Diarmuid Connolly in space. However, they are unlikely to get as much joy as they did against a loose Tyrone defence. In Karl Lacey and Niall McGee Donegal have two top-class defenders comfortable in one-on-one situations and that will limit the damage this trio can inflict on the Ulstermen.
Secondly, Dublin will try to kick points from distance. They have a plethora of players capable of this. While this will keep the scoreboard ticking over, it won’t win the game for them.
Finally, if I was Gilroy I feel the most effective way to go at Donegal is to front them up. Attack their strengths. Donegal sit back, turnover the opposition through sheer weight of numbers and counterattack at pace before delivering long ball to Michael Murphy and Colm McFadden. They defend as a unit but, crucially, they also attack as a unit with everyone pouring forward together. Ironically, they are most vulnerable immediately after turning over a team as they counterattack. This is when Dublin should push up on Donegal, further up the field than usual for them and go for the jugular. Barry Cahill, Bryan Cullen and Paul Flynn in particular should fill this role, rather than retreating to condense the space in front of their defence. If they turn over Donegal immediately this is the only time that the Ulstermen are wide open and goals can be had.
STEPHEN CLUXTON and his kick-out strategy has long been a central plank of Dublin’s game plan. He is constantly improving and innovating though. He is kicking frees and has made a couple of subtle changes this year. Previously Dublin liked to create pockets of space to deliver his restarts. To create these kick-out zones involved a lot of movement from Dublin’s outfield players which expended huge amounts of energy. Often come the last 10 minutes of games many Dublin players were exhausted from this constant off the ball movement.
In 2009 we focused on Cluxton’s kick-out. We denied Dublin the pockets of space they craved and their game plan disintegrated. This year Cluxton prefers to go longer. As well as his midfielders he also uses Paul Flynn, Bryan Cullen and Barry Cahill. The main advantage is that Dublin are securing possession further up the field, which allows them to attack quicker. Crucially, Cluxton also controls the pace the game is played at. He is noticeably keeping the tempo up by restarting the game as quickly as he can as often as possible. From a Donegal point of view they will need to successfully target Cluxton and his kick-outs to win as he can become upset and lose focus which transmits to the rest of the team. When this happens Dublin are vulnerable and there for the taking.
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