Armagh don’t need schooling on how to talk about days like these. For Galway 2022 and Derry and Monaghan 2023, read Donegal 2024. They were good enough to win this Ulster final and close out a chapter that has been dragging on since 2008. And still they didn’t get it done.
For Kieran McGeeney, drawing fast conclusions based on the margins between success and failure has always been a dullard’s business. Armagh were four points up in the 53rd minute of normal time, primed to take the day. They didn’t score again until the seventh minute of extra-time. That, rather than the penalty shoot-out, was where their Ulster title leaked away.
“The standard from both teams, serious pace, serious tackles – it’s a ball one way or a ball the other. A slip one way or a slip the other. When you lose you’re the gobshite, but that’s just the way it goes,” McGeeney said.
[ Shootout glory hands Donegal first Ulster title in five yearsOpens in new window ]
“I suppose the thing is, winning in ordinary time. But it’s tough, it’s hard work and I suppose somebody has to miss. I was never really a penalty-taker myself, it’s just one of those things. You guess right, like, Shane [McPartlan] is probably the best penalty-taker in the team, and of all people.
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“When you‘ve been on the receiving it and when you lose four or five massive games where we’ve been on the bad end of it, it is difficult and there’s no point in saying otherwise. We can’t do much about it.”
McGeeney has been around long enough to know how this goes now. Unless and until Armagh see a big game out, they will be everyone’s fall-guy. Getting so close in these epic encounters speaks well of just about everything in their set-up – their score-taking was terrific at times here, their defensive shield meant Donegal never got a sniff of a goal over almost 100 minutes of football. But you are who you are until you change who you are.
“Sure what can you do about it?” McGeeney said. “I can’t control what is written. And when you win a game by a point or a penalty shoot-out – it was the same against Derry last year, we were doing a lot of things wrong and they were doing a lot of things right. But listen, we all know that’s sport. We need headlines and drama, it’s all part of the game and you get used to it.”
Jim McGuinness knows the shape and make of these days too. This makes it four Ulster titles for him as Donegal manager. He’s had them for 17 games in the Ulster Championship since 2011 and only lost once, the 2013 final against Monaghan. Coming back to take Donegal was never on the cards. But it was never completely off the cards either.
“I was on a different trajectory myself,” McGuinness said. “I was walking away from a part of my life that I put a lot into. And I want to go back to it some day.”
[ Margins paper thin at Clones as McGuinness and Donegal reap final rewardOpens in new window ]
This is what he came back for. A throbbing St Tiernach’s Park. All the chips in the pot. Two squads standing in midfield, five players each on the 45, walking up to take the spot kicks to decide it all. Living.
“We ended up on the right side of it,” he said. “Myself and Kieran had a quick word before the penalties were taken – what do you do, you know? You have to roll with the punches at that stage and put your faith and your trust in it.
“For us, the fact that we were four points down in a massive game and were able to respond. That’s the big one for us. They’ve done that a few times now, twice against Tyrone. Particularly the second time when they were three points down in the second half. It felt like a lot on the day and they got over the line.
“It wasn’t easy. But we played Armagh in Armagh and we responded to a similar situation. Rian O’Neill kicked a massive score and we responded. Same thing happened in the league final and against Tyrone as well. So we have a habit of digging in. Not losing their heads, trying to stay in the game, keep believing. They did that really well, particularly when that four point deficit crept in.
“It felt like the Armagh fans thought that was their moment. And it felt like that to the Armagh players as well. And even though that doesn’t mean anything, it’s an intangible – it’s a big thing.”
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