Repentant Cluxton’s red in the past, says Macauley

Stephen Cluxton apologised to his Dublin team-mates following hissending off against Mayo last Saturday week, Michael Darragh Macauley has revealed.

The Dublin captain is expected to return for Sunday’s Division 1 semi-final against Cork in Croke Park after Sean Currie deputised for him in the win over Tyrone last Sunday.

Macauley said Cluxton’s kick at Kevin McLoughlin is something the rest of the panel could easily forgive and forget.

“He knows he was in the wrong. He lost his cool for a moment. No one’s going to hold it over his head for any amount of time. It’s something Stephen apologised for and he has to get on with it now.

“Hopefully, he’ll learn his lesson. There’s been a few red cards this season and it’s something we, as a team,definitely have to move on from. It can’t keep happening.”

Rory O’Carroll became the latest to see red with a second yellow in Omagh, but Dublin have also seen themselves subjected to some onfield hostilities too, Sunday’s match-winner Diarmuid Connolly being an example.

“It’s probably the same for most of us at the moment and he along with others come in for a bit of abuse and you just have to stand up and take it.”

Macauley took great pleasure from the fortitude 14-men Dublin showed in keeping their composure to claim the win over Tyrone at the weekend.

“I am very proud of the way we finished the match and we showed a bit of resolve to hold out in the way we did.

“A lot of this team have been together for a while now and we are after coming through All-Ireland finals, semi-finals and quarter-finals and it’s all that experience that stood to us. You can either drop your head and say ‘this game is beyond us’ and you draw off that mental resolve from other games. You have to have that never-say-die attitude if you want to go anywhere. It would have been very easy for us to throw in the towel at a certain point and the same the week before (v Mayo). But in fairness, the lads came back strongly and we finished out the game and showed a good bit of heart in doing it.”

Macauley is naturally wary of Cork having lost to them in Croke Park last month. “Cork have definitely been the team to beat this year. They’ve been playing very good. They’ve a huge panel, some very experienced lads, some new lads coming through that are looking very good as well.”