The most pleasing thing for Monaghan manager Vinny Corey on Saturday night wasn’t so much that they had beaten Dublin but the personnel they had beaten them with. Of the 20 players who featured in the 3-9 to 1-14 victory, no fewer than eight were playing their first senior match in Croke Park.
This is not to say it was their first time on the pitch – at least not for all of them. Corner-forward David Garland is no newbie, having been in and around the county panel as far back as Malachy O’Rourke’s time in 2018. He’s been a revelation at Sigerson level for the past few years as well. But until Saturday night, his Croke Park experience had all been in a white coat – he was an umpire for referee Martin McNally in his younger days and has been on duty in an All-Ireland minor semi-final at HQ, no less.
But we digress. The fact that Corey was able to refresh his squad to such an extent and still come away with a win over the All-Ireland champions says only good things about the systems and structures they have in the county. Players from 13 different clubs saw game time on Saturday night. Since there are only 32 clubs in the county, that’s a commendable level of husbandry any way you look at it.
To be able to replace Rory Beggan, who hadn’t missed a match in league or championship for over a decade, with a keeper in Darren McDonnell who pulled off a fine save when the match was in the balance and kicked a 48-metre free into the bargain, was just as crucial as anything that happened out the field. McDonnell is 28 and has had to bide his time but apart from one slight dither in possession in the second half, he looked pretty comfortable on his debut.
Corey is flushing new faces into Monaghan’s bloodstream by necessity. If Beggan does miss the year – although he’s still training with the team and Corey clearly hasn’t lost hope on that score – Monaghan will go into the summer without six of last year’s panel. Whatever about grabbing the two points on Saturday night, you’d have to imagine that will weaken them as the year goes on and that Corey has longer-term hopes for the new blood he has brought in.
It made for an interesting contrast with Dublin. Dessie Farrell handed out just two debuts, one from the start and one off the bench. Luke Breathnach scored a fine mark from wing forward and Theo Clancy came in for Eoin Murchan late on. Clancy, of course, has Croke Park experience, having been such a stalwart of those Kilmacud Crokes campaigns in recent years. But otherwise, familiar faces were everywhere.
This, you could argue, is because Farrell started his refresh a couple of seasons back. Lee Gannon has played three seasons of intercounty football and been nominated for an All Star in two of them. The likes of Sean McMahon, Cian Murphy, Lorcan O’Dell and Ross McGarry have all been consistent league performers since the beginning of the decade. Even Greg McEneaney, the youngest of the Dublin players on Saturday, played in a good chunk of the league last year and has a championship man-of-the-match award to his name from last summer.
Spin the tape on to June and July, though, and you have to wonder how many of them will truly be in the mix. Farrell confirmed afterwards that Stephen Cluxton and Mick Fitzsimons will be back in action before the league is out. The first subs off the bench on Saturday night were James McCarthy and Colm Basquel. Paul Mannion and John Small will both be on duty soon enough too.
Of those six, each of them a first-teamer, Basquel is the youngest at 27. Indeed, he’s the only one of them this side of 30. The famed ‘93s – the underage crop that produced Mannion, Small, Brian Fenton, Ciarán Kilkenny and Jack McCaffrey – all turn 31 this year. Cormac Costello and Niall Scully turn 30. Nobody’s saying they’re done or that Farrell needs to cut them loose en masse. But the clock is undefeated, always.
They seemed to feel that, too, back in July when they celebrated their All-Ireland. It seemed to be their first instinct, that the gang had got back together for one last stand and that it felt okay to start talking about the end. It’s nobody’s business but their own that they’ve decided to go again. But the history of sport isn’t exactly coming down with examples of teams who got old together and kept winning all the way to the end.
All of which makes it slightly surprising that Farrell hasn’t tried to bring in a few more younger faces, particularly in attack. Maybe they’re not there, unlikely as that might seem. But give it a couple of seasons and they’ll have to be there. The ‘93s will all be getting on with their lives and the Dublin manager of the day won’t have any choice in the matter.
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