Preparation has to be 100%, warns Philly McMahon

Philly McMahon isn’t concerned that Dublin’s provincial dominance will leave them vulnerable entering the final stages of the championship.

Jim Gavin’s men coasted to a 10th Leinster football title in 11 seasons earlier this month, coming through their three games by an average winning margin of 19-points.

Kerry footballer James O’Donoghue yesterday insisted you can’t replicate a tight, hard-fought championship game in training, but corner-back McMahon believes Dublin’s inter-panel competition has off-set the lack of meaningful games they’ve had thus far in the championship.

“A lot of people say Leinster is not good preparation (for the All- Ireland quarter-final and beyond), but they don’t know.

“They’re generally not players,” he quipped.

“And I think anybody who has been in a province that they’ve won and a lot of people think they’ve won it comfortably, they don’t know what they’re talking about. Because the preparation is really hard. You’re going in and you’re competing hard.

“If you think you’re playing an easy team, your team-mate is going to come in and take your spot.

“Your preparation has to be 100% all the time. Your standards have to be 100% all the time. That’s the difference between good players and very good players.

“If you think of it this way, if Donegal had played us in Leinster last year, they still would have beaten us.

“So we just... we got caught on the hop, I suppose. There were a couple of things going into this season that we needed to work on and hopefully we’ll get a chance to show that we’ve done that.”

Commenting on Ger Brennan’s departure from the panel last week, McMahon said: “Ger is a massive leader on the team. We’re lucky enough that we’ve got a really strong panel there to fill a spot. Because he did play that role really well.

“Ger was a great talker on the pitch, a great organiser as well. It’s something that I suppose every player around has to try and do a little bit more of, especially the way the game is going.

“I’m not sure in terms of medically, where he’s at.

“But he’s decided to take a little break, get back to the club and he’ll be back at the start of next year.”