It felt like Jim McGuinness had ripped some pages from the Alex Ferguson playbook last Sunday - the chapter on “us against the world”.
The Donegal manager was apparently frustrated by the scheduling of Dr Hyde Park to host his team’s All-Ireland round-robin match against Mayo. His remarks to that effect caused something of a dispute between Donegal and the GAA’s Central Competitions Control Committee.
But sweep away that thin veneer and maybe it was more about engineering a sense of Donegal against the world. Or the world against Donegal. Take your pick.
It was about galvanising the squad, galvanising the county. It was more about what’s to come rather than what has already taken place.
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McGuinness doesn’t strike me as somebody who expresses such sentiments without having first walked through the consequences in his head. It’s all part of a plan and a strategy.
McGuinness remarked: “You’re 38 minutes from Mayo’s training ground. We’re 3½ hours from Inishowen. It’s not fair. If I don’t say it, who’s going to say it?”
Having travel distances at hand showed this was a message McGuinness had pre-cooked and was keen to express.
It wasn’t really about the venue. It was about creating a siege mentality. Additionally, it was used as a deflection tactic because Donegal’s level of performance probably wasn’t where he would have wanted it to be last Sunday.
The Mayo match rounded off a slightly disappointing group stage for Donegal. They never really reproduced the levels they showed in the Ulster final.
Donegal would have targeted finishing top of their group, so the last few weeks haven’t panned out as McGuinness and his management team would have liked. The preliminary quarter-final is a game they could have done without.
So, it was an opportune time to rally the county behind a cause, stir up a “them versus us” mentality. Ultimately, it creates a fuss around an issue that is not going to have any material impact on whether Donegal win the All-Ireland or not.
Should they beat Louth in Ballybofey on Sunday, then Donegal will play the rest of their championship games at Croke Park. Moaning about a venue at this stage is incidental.
However, it does allow the Donegal squad and their supporters to unite behind a perceived sense of unfairness and use it as a motivational tool for the weeks ahead. In that regard, McGuinness had nothing to lose by shaking a few trees in his post-match interview last Sunday. At this stage of the championship, teams will use whatever they can to gain an edge.
If you should be beating a team by 20 points and you don’t beat them by 20 points, then that’s probably a sign of complacency or a lack of humility
For years, it was thrown at Dublin about playing all our championship games in Croke Park. When we were asked about it, the message from the players and management was consistent – we are happy to play anywhere; we don’t decide on venues.
And we were happy to play outside of Croke Park. That wasn’t just a throwaway comment. Looking back now, some of my fondest memories were going to play down the country. Those away trips were great for team-bonding and encouraging camaraderie. I would have liked to play in more of the grounds around the country.
But we were aware of the narrative out there around us playing in Croke Park. When our success reached a certain level during that era, everybody outside of Dublin wanted us to be beaten, which is understandable.
We certainly used that as a motivating factor. It wasn’t a central tenet of our preparations, but I think we kind of fed off that as a group.
We got a huge amount of confidence during that period because the group was so tight-knit. The dressingroom became a sacred place – when we were in there, it felt like it was us against everybody else, and that worked for us.
It wasn’t about going out to prove people wrong – it was more about showing the opposition absolute respect. You do that by beating them by as much as possible. If you should be beating a team by 20 points and you don’t beat them by 20 points, then that’s probably a sign of complacency or a lack of humility because you are not doing what you should be doing.
And I think there might have been an element of that in the comments by McGuinness last week.
Donegal need to rediscover their form from earlier in the championship, because in the defeat to Tyrone and for parts of last week’s win over Mayo, they weren’t doing what they should have been doing in terms of putting the opposition away. Instead, that result hung in the balance right until the last kick of the ball.
Given how the second half panned out, Donegal could quite easily have ended up losing and found themselves finishing third in the group and now facing the prospect of a trip to Killarney this weekend.
So, while McGuinness will be pleased by the character and ruthlessness they showed to win the game, it wasn’t as convincing a victory for Donegal as they probably would have liked.
Instead, it was another draining 70 minutes for a team that has played more games than most in this year’s championship.
Sunday’s preliminary quarter-final will be Donegal’s eighth outing having already played Derry, Monaghan, Down, Armagh, Tyrone, Cavan and Mayo. Only Meath have played as many matches as Donegal – and the Royals have avoided the prelims.
So, perhaps McGuinness just felt now was the right time to spark a little fire.
You cannot keep the “us against the world” psychology going for six months but it’s something that can be helpful in a shorter window. There are just five weeks until the All-Ireland final, so McGuinness probably reasoned that leaning into it now would pull the group nice and tight for the journey ahead.
There is probably a bit of pressure on the group as well because the expectation levels have increased – Donegal are fancied by many to win the All-Ireland.
McGuinness delivered Sam Maguire in year two during his first term in charge and so parallels will be drawn between 2012 and 2025. One key difference is that for this group, 2025 looks like their best shot at winning the All-Ireland.
Donegal made it back to an All-Ireland final two years after the 2012 triumph, but I wouldn’t be as convinced this group will still be as competitive two seasons from now as they currently are.
Michael Murphy, for one, is unlikely to be still togging out for the county. Will McGuinness still be there? Key players like Patrick McBrearty and Ryan McHugh have spent well over a decade in the trenches. I think it’s pretty much now for this Donegal team. The players know this team’s window for success will not be open forever. That all adds to the pressure.
And with the team not performing as well as they should, maybe that’s why this “us against them” messaging emerged from the Donegal camp last weekend. Because, let’s be honest, Donegal are not exactly the most loathed team in the country. Far from it, I would have thought.
They are expected to beat Louth on Sunday and I believe that is exactly what will happen, but Ger Brennan’s Leinster champions have nothing to lose and I’d expect them to bring a decent performance.
Beyond that, Donegal will need more from the likes of McBrearty and Oisín Gallen in supporting Michael Murphy up top. Gallen, for me, is the key. He was exceptional last year, won an All Star and brought that real x-factor quality to his play, but I don’t think he has got back to those high standards this season.
All it takes for a player of his ability to find his mojo again is one good game. If he can deliver a big performance against Louth, then Donegal will travel to Croke Park as a much more formidable outfit.
Either way, the Ulster champions are likely to be among the last eight when the quarter-finals take centre stage next weekend.
Because the racket last Sunday about venues wasn’t really about Dr Hyde Park, it was about benefiting Donegal when they get to Croke Park.
