Gavin banking on Brogan and Andrews boost for final

Jim Gavin expects Bernard Brogan and Peadar Andrews to be fit for Dublin’s Leinster final meeting with Meath later this month.

Brogan missed out on yesterday’s outing with the hamstring injury that cut short his involvement in the quarter-final against Laois, but the Dublin manager claimed yesterday evening the forward had been quite close to making it.

Andrews was pulled from the starting line-up late on Saturday night with a sprained wrist and replaced by Paul Mannion, who helped himself to three points from play while being deprived of as many goals by last-ditch defending.

Dublin’s reserves were even more apparent after the break, with Cormac Costello, Eoghan O’Gara and Tomas Brady coming off the bench to land 1-9, with just one point of that coming from dead balls.

Gavin made all the usual noises afterwards about how numbers on backs were irrelevant and everybody buying into the team ethos, but the competition for places in that forward unit must be ferocious.

Yesterday’s display follows on from the nine points contributed by the subs’ list against Laois and it remains to be seen if Mick O’Dowd’s Meath are any better equipped to combat that depth of firepower come July 20.

“Any time Dublin play Meath it’s always a threat. It’s a two-horse race, toss a coin and pick the winner,” said Gavin. “We probably are at the same level we were last year and Meath seem to have pushed on: a big score against Carlow, another big score today.

“They certainly won’t fear playing Dublin a Leinster final. It was a very competitive game last year, five points in it. We can expect the same closeness and the same battle as it was last year.”

Gavin was wrong about one thing: Dublin beat Meath by seven points last year. Three separated them in the decider 12 months earlier. Proof, perhaps, that Meath can get under their skin.