Awfully harsh on Monaghan
They were the better team for me
Looking forward to Kerry Dublin though. Something tells me Kerry have a big performance in them
I don’t feel sorry for Monaghan. They gave it a huge effort but Kerry held their nerve and played with their heads for the last 10 minutes while Monaghan lost their composure somewhat. Bryan Sheehan coming on and popping over two crucial late points emphasised the strength of their bench. All 3 O’Se brothers really delivered late on. Marc’s block on Freeman, Tomas with the winning point and Dara who caught some superb ball under pressure late on. Monaghan can be proud of how much they’ve improved and they can keep building based on the players they have. Really like the centre back Gary McQuaid - a smashing player.
While Monaghan didn’t fade spectacularly and didn’t really bottle it either they shuold have done a better job at closing out the game. Some effort from Kerry near the end and they were awesome in the last quarter of the game but there was plenty for other teams to be encouraged about. At times Monaghan cut right through them and it was more individual efforts in defence rather than solid defending that kept the score down.
Had meant to make that point earlier actually. While it was impressive the way Kerry used their experience and didn’t panic when 3 points down with 15 minutes to go their overall display wasn’t very good at all. As farmer says there’s always the suspicion they can raise it and blow a team away but based on today their full back line isn’t as tight without Mike McCarthy and they struggled to make scores from play until deep into the second half.
Had tipped Monaghan (while speaking to people at work) to win that one so was delighted with myself when it looked like they were going to. Their number 26 who failed to point at the end and put it far left but not even reaching the line should be shot.
Think Dublin should beat Kerry in the semi as they’ll not be able to cope with their power and athleticism. Be interesting to see who plays at full back to counteract Donaghy. Kerry are almost a one trick pony at this stage. I suppose that’s possibly a bit harsh but the high ball into Donaghy annoys me at this stage.
I presume McConnell will be marking him (at the start anyway). He’s a tall lad but he hasn’t impressed at full back in any of the games so far so I don’t know why he’d be any better against Donaghy. There aren’t any other standout contenders either. We’ve plenty of corner backs (O’Shaughnessy and O’Shea on the bench are very good defenders) but nobody who’d really dominate at the edge of the square.
What a woeful effort that was from the Monaghan sub at the end. Pure bottled it.
In fairness to the Monaghan sub he was the lad that got kicked full in the face by Dara O’S from the kick-out that led to Toms O’S’s winning point. He was obviously concussed and didn’t really know where he was. He was actually then substituted after that attempt on goal event yhough he’d only come on after about 60 minutes
Didn’t notice it was the same guy but well done for bringing up that kick. Not intentional by S but how the referee didn’t give a free kick there is beyond me. He was about 2 yards away and yer man took a fierce belt.
Indeed, good spot Bandage. I’d echo your sentiments about the ref there rocko.