Declan Bonner: Championship format far from ideal but Donegal just happy to get back playing

Donegal manager Declan Bonner. Photo by Eóin Noonan/Sportsfile

Declan Bonner knows he has to plot but only to a point. God laughs when man plans but when a manager does it beyond beating the team in front of him in the Ulster Senior Football Championship, he guffaws.

For Donegal, charting a course out of the province could prove onerous depending on next week’s draw. As they have avoided the preliminary round these last two seasons, there is a two in five chance of them being picked out of the hat for the province’s opening SFC game - Cavan, Derry, Monaghan, and Tyrone are exempt.