How Do You Beat Donegal?

After yesterdays performance against many peoples favorites the question on a lot of peoples tongues, not least Gilroy and Horan - is just how do you go about trying to beat Donegal.

They have a tactically astute manager who knows what hes about when it comes to preparing teams and, they have a bunch of players who are 100% committed to the cause and are super fit. They arent bad ball players either. They are well organised, never give up. They have made big strides from last years one dimensional side.

After yesterdays game they have confirmed if we didnt already know it that they can stand toe to toe with anyone and beat them. They have now accounted for Tyrone Kerry and Cork. And before yesterdays game many predicted that this years All Ireland winners would come from this semi final. They play a brand of football akin to that of Tyrone in 2005-2008 were every man was comfortable and composed on the ball, there is a very definite game plan which every player understands and executes almost perfectly.

I'm not suggesting they dont have weaknesses but to date no one has exposed those sufficiently to cause them any real problems. So i dont know what Gilroy or Horan are going to bring to the table in terms of a game plan to beat them. Cork tried to play Donegal at their own game and got beat out the gate.

So just how do you beat Donegal?????

One thing I would say is that Donegal have a huge advantage this time around against Dublin and that is the hunger to win an All Ireland. Dublin's hunger appears to have eased off now the long wait for Sam has ended. The only way to stop Donegal now is to have another team of 15 with rifles in their hands, nothing is going to stop them.

how i see it since dublin in 2011 the only man to come close to breaking donegals system was your own countytyrone ,donegal have being 7/8 points a better a team in all the games since.i dont see the all ireland is a fore gone conclusion,if mayo beat dublin they would fancy there chances,if dublin beat mayo the dublin team have b eatings jim system already so that should keep jim focused,what amazed me in the last couple of games that kerry cork never kept there shape and got punished on the break because they pushed to many players forward,donegal have being good at turn over ball the only team i see falling to that trap is mayo,donegal dublin final would be fascinating very similar to last year i think 1 mistake from either side could decide it

it should all be revealed in the 3rd weekend of september , i think the winner of next weeks game will win a tight final

to beat donegal you need to have a system in place which players are comfortable with. the plan would involve

1. not holding onto possession moving the ball quick to a man in support, cardinal sin against the donegal men is running into the tackle as they will bottle you up turn you over and counter attack

2. quick accurate kick passing to an inside full forward line from around the middle to try and go over the top so to speak of the mass defence, but has there ever been a team save for maybe crossmaglen who could kick long accurate ball for 70+ minutes to an inside full forward line. have watched a lot fo the old finals and there wasnt too much skillful long kicking then either , just hoof her up thon field and let the other half dozen sort her out!

3. fitness and conditioning, is there another team as fit and strong and well prepared as donegal this year?

i cant see donegal beat this year i have tipped them against cork thought they may have needed extra time to sort out kerry and didnt fancy my own outfit against them either. Next year will be a different ball game as with sam in the hills will jim be able to push the men on to do what no one bar kerry have done for nearly 25 years retain sam! i think the dubs will beat mayo and dublin won last year because they were well organised hungry and had a few quality players , nothing but the hunger has changed, donegal have murphy mcfadden lacey mcgee mchugh and mcbrearty all good bets to be lifting foot tall statues come novemeber.

in saying all that they have slightly switched off for the last 5-10 minutes against both cork and kerry giving away goals in this time frame and they do miss a fair few chances, so to beat them you need to take 95% of your scoring chances also they only really shoot from the middle of the goals trying to keep the main scorers such as mcfadden and murphy outside the middle channel may reduce their scores. laceys runs from deep need to be watched and a good strong running half forward asigned to him, i think if the man on lacey could stop him scoring even if it nullifed them would do a great job.

Take long-range scores.
Attack down the wings.
Be patient.
Make them work hard by swinging the ball from side to side.
Don't believe the hype.

RMDrive wrote:Take long-range scores.
Attack down the wings.
Be patient.
Make them work hard by swinging the ball from side to side.
Don't believe the hype.

Yes, that would be a good start. I think Tyrone, both last year and this year, opened Donegal up more than any other side. They did this by moving the ball very wide and playing the game at a high tempo. The ball was off-loaded to runners off the shoulder, and the aim was to constantly keep moving forward.

Tyrone's problem, though, was that in 2011 we were too old to keep going, especially when we didn't get the early scores as reward for our dominance, and this year we were too light, with the battering we took quickly wearing us down after half time. You have to be strong and fit against Donegal, but you also need to have footballers who can move the ball quickly. Width, again, is crucial.

The alternative to this is what Dublin did last year, and refuse to allow Donegal to counter attack. You sit very deep, bottle up McFadden and Murphy, and hope to beat them by the odd score. Having a top free-taker is essential in this scenario.

Twice against tyrone
Twice against down
Gooch against kerry
Kelly last week after robbing Mchugh

All found a channel to goal when running from the attacking left flank towards the left hand side of the square - all of these could have been goals and all it took was to beat one man.
When mcglynnn or mcgrath run forward they both seem to gravitate towards their left wing.

Ive been nervous on half a dozen occasions when donegal were attacked on the other side.

What's the old adage about smoke and fire....Jimmy looks to be considering his options.
Hard to stand in his way if truth be told, this is his primary forte and if he's getting the shekels for it then what would you do. I'd rather be drawing the salary, as it would put more meat on the table annually than the odd few claps on the back from OMAR and RMD***

***In advance of the all too awaited boot in the hole...Best of luck to him in any event.

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Boxtyeater wrote:What's the old adage about smoke and fire....Jimmy looks to be considering his options.
Hard to stand in his way if truth be told, this is his primary forte and if he's getting the shekels for it then what would you do. I'd rather be drawing the salary, as it would put more meat on the table annually than the odd few claps on the back from OMAR and RMD***

***In advance of the all too awaited boot in the hole...Best of luck to him in any event.

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Its a no brainer Boxty, getting the chance to work with world renowned superstars like Neil Lennon and (BOC struggles to name any other Celtic superstars!!!)

In fairness though could you blame him if he was to take it, to get paid to do something you love must be the ultimate job satisfaction.

If i was a Donegal fan though i would be concerned at his overtures that he will combine both roles, it simply wont work. If he was working 24/7 last year with the Donegal project how is he going to mix the two this time.

If Celtic are paying him they are going to get first refusal on his services are they not????

Great opportunity for him but alas its the news most of Donegal didnt want to hear i feel.

Does this open the door for John Joe Doherty's return?

Best of luck to Jim. If he can balance both jobs great. Celtic wont be doing much during the cahampionship so that should ease the pressure. Man,young family,has the talents and remain loyal to Donegal and gettting good salary. Fair play Jim you deserve it.

Ah im sure with modern technology they can work out some sort of APP, Skype, Facetime etc
No news here

Sure Glasgows a lot handier to Glenties than Galway was to South Armagh and Joe Kiernan managed
it

OMAR wrote:Ah im sure with modern technology they can work out some sort of APP, Skype, Facetime etc
No news here

Sure Glasgows a lot handier to Glenties than Galway was to South Armagh and Joe Kiernan managed
it

yeah but Joe was only doing one job, mind you there were plenty in Galway who even doubted if he was doing that one job.

Omar is having that Friday feeling, but Boc has this one spot on. In addition to the demands that Celtic would put on him, Jimmy will put huge pressure on himself to succeed there and forge a new career for himself. There is no way he could do both roles to tbe best of his abilities, and the Champs may soon be joining Waterford as the only team in the country without a manager.

So Jim will demand 100% from his players but not give it himself? He should do the decent thing and step down. He's a man with a family and nobody would blame him for taking the Celtic job.

I think it's no coincidence that Jim has waited till I am out of the country until announcing this. Most importantly, Jim deserves to take his career as far as he can. He has his own family and his own life to look after.

Will it work part time? Hard to know, but I'd be pretty sure that Jim has considered all of these things. People are forgetting that he was already running a business alongside managing the DL team. If he is replacing that consultancy work with the Celtic work then I think it could be workable. I'll defer to Jim's thinking on this. He is a proud Donegal man and I honestly believe that he would not stay in the DL job if he thought that he couldn't be as effective as before. And maybe it's an opportunity to get a few more people involved in Jim's backroom team with a view to the next generation of management.

One thing I would worry about is that every slip up by the team next year will be blamed on this. If we get beat by Tyrone (which is a strong possibility) then everyone will sudden be on about how they knew this was going to happen and it's all down to Jim's double-jobbing. If there are discipline issues, then Jim will be losing his grip on the team etc .....

RMDrive wrote:I think it's no coincidence that Jim has waited till I am out of the country until announcing this. Most importantly, Jim deserves to take his career as far as he can. He has his own family and his own life to look after.

Will it work part time? Hard to know, but I'd be pretty sure that Jim has considered all of these things. People are forgetting that he was already running a business alongside managing the DL team. If he is replacing that consultancy work with the Celtic work then I think it could be workable. I'll defer to Jim's thinking on this. He is a proud Donegal man and I honestly believe that he would not stay in the DL job if he thought that he couldn't be as effective as before. And maybe it's an opportunity to get a few more people involved in Jim's backroom team with a view to the next generation of management.

One thing I would worry about is that every slip up by the team next year will be blamed on this. If we get beat by Tyrone (which is a strong possibility given) then everyone will sudden be on about how they knew this was going to happen and it's all down to Jim's double-jobbing. If there are discipline issues, then Jim will be losing his grip on the team etc .....

thats it RMD he is setting himself up for a fall with this one, but then he done that with the whole Cassidy thing and lived to tell the tale.

Dont know if increasing the backroom team is what he needs, sometimes the more guys you have involved the more bother you can have. A tight knit team like he had is the way to go.

Hope it works out for him, its an opportunity of a lifetime and one he couldn't pass up.

Dunno how it will go down in Glasgow with Celtic playing twelve men behind the ball next year and no-one in the attacking half ....

Parouisa wrote:Dunno how it will go down in Glasgow with Celtic playing twelve men behind the ball next year and no-one in the attacking half ....

Takes away the risk of "freemason" referees and linesmen giving bad offside decisions