Dublin sitting pretty

A Division 1 semi-final awaits All-Ireland champions Dublin providing they win one of their remaining league ties against Mayo and Cork.

A point from those fixtures could yet be enough but Pat Gilroy is aiming to sustain the momentum after Saturday’s victory over Donegal in front of a 23,855 crowd at Croke Park.

“They’re going to be two tough games to get points from,” he noted after a game which saw 12 of his players contribute to the scoresheet.

“There wasn’t an easy game in this league. It will be hard to get two points out of those last two but I’d say two should be enough to get into the play-offs.”

Donegal, on the other hand, face a relegation battle at home to Armagh on Sunday week with the losers almost certainly set for Division 2 next season. After earning promotion last year, Jim McGuinness won’t want his team to return to the second rung.

But for captain Michael Murphy’s injury-enforced exit with 11 minutes remaining when Donegal were just two points in arrears on Saturday, the April 8 date with Armagh mightn’t be so do-or-die.

“Generally speaking, we’ll take a lot of positives,” said McGuinness. “The first-half, we finished up with five points and that’s something we’re trying to work on. We proved that we could do it in the second-half and we proved it against a good side so hopefully we can build on that.”

In an encounter devoid of the negativity that blemished last August’s All-Ireland semi-final and also lacking intensity, Dublin’s only wobbles came in the first 20 minutes of the second-half when Donegal twice drew level.

But with Murphy, influential as ever, hobbling for the best part of seven minutes with a “locked” left knee before he was taken off, Donegal’s challenge dissipated.

Four Dublin scores without reply put them 0-15 to 0-11 ahead in the 63rd minute. David Walsh and Martin McElhinney scored either side of Diarmuid Connolly’s first point from play but then Bryan Cullen and the St Vincents man fashioned goals in injury-time to apply the gloss.

Gilroy’s side actually never went behind in the game but he was flattered by the nine-point margin of victory.

As for Donegal’s style, he recognised it as a departure from their much-criticised 2011 tactic.

“They had a very different defensive structure now than what they had. It certainly wasn’t as defensive, in the first-half in particular, as in the All-Ireland semi-final. They came out a fair bit with the ball. There wasn’t 13 or 14 men in their half. It was a lot more open.

“The last 15 minutes in Croke Park, when you’re doing that kind of workrate, it can leave holes and you saw with the very last goal there were three people in that half and acres of space. I think that happens in the league.”

McGuinness took encouragement from how Donegal attacked in the second-half although he acknowledged they have more work to get up to Dublin’s fitness levels.

“We seemed to be finding a bit of space as well by going at them. They were playing well as well but we got it to 0-11 apiece and it looked like anybody’s game at that stage.

“To be beaten by nine points when it was 0-11 each, I didn’t think that was going to happen but the goals came very late and we did fatigue in the last five or 10 minutes.”

Dublin were by far the better team in the first-half, holding four-point leads on two occasions and going in at the break 0-9 to 0-5 ahead.

Kevin McManamon was industrious, picking up two of his scores in the first-half, as Dublin managed to keep Donegal at arm’s length throughout the 35 minutes.

That said, it was hardly a commanding Dublin performance. McManamon and Michael Darragh Macauley coughed up a lot of possession in the second-half even though they more than compensated for it.

There were positives in Dean Rock and Johnny Cooper’s displays too while Alan Brogan (calf), Ger Brennan (virus) and Tomás Quinn (leg) should be fit for Mayo in five days’ time.

Scorers for Dublin: D Connolly 1-3 (0-2 frees); B Cullen 1-1; K McManamon 0-3; J Cooper, MD Macauley, E Fennell, A Brogan, T Quinn, D Kelly, S Cluxton (free), P Flynn, D Rock 0-1 each.

Scorers for Donegal: M Murphy 0-6 (three frees, 1 45); A Thompson, L McLoone, N McGee, P McBrearty (free), C Toye, D Walsh, M McElhinney 0-1 each.

Subs for Dublin: S Murray for Brennan (inj 24); D Rock for Brogan (inj 30); D Kelly for T Quinn (inj h-t); C Dias for Cooper (59).

Subs for Donegal: D Walsh for O’Reilly (35+1); A Hanlon for Murphy (inj 59); D McLaughlin for Bradley (64).

Referee: Eddie Kinsella (Laois).