GAELIC GAMES/ Ulster SFC Final: There will be no alternative Ulster. Not this year. Not on Joe Kernan's watch. As the clans fled back to the mysterious province last night, the brightest light of its football constellation burned a familiar orange.
The Anglo-Celt Cup will rest once again in the townlands of Crossmaglen, Dromintee, Mullaghbawn for its fourth winter in six years. Armagh are the redoubtable masters of the local scene but never before did they stamp their foot on provincial affairs with such formidable and withering finality. They tore apart a young Donegal team so completely that, by the end, it was like watching a killing scene from wildlife - 3-15 to 0-11. A scoreline to send out shivers across the land.
It did not matter that the northern pageant had been moved from the parochial hall to the Abbey Theatre or that 67,136 people gathered in the hope of a classic derby. It did not matter that the young Donegal stylists were rent with nerves. Nothing mattered because Armagh were in a mood that was as frightening as it was majestic.
Armagh performed with the fierce and unrelenting dignity of a proven, championship team who have not, in truth, ever been given the praise they have deserved. Perhaps it will take another successful September to garner general acclaim to greatness but Armagh have never been concerned with that anyway. They are a rare and completely unreadable bunch.
"It is as impressive as I have seen from Armagh over the years," sighed Donegal's John Gildea. The Glenties man made his first summer appearance yesterday at half-time, with his team trailing by 1-9 to 0-4, and left the field with the look of an old dog who knows he has been whipped.
"And I have come up against them a lot. They look as lean and hungry as I have seen. That's the fourth Ulster final for me and still no silverware and it doesn't look like I'll ever get it at this stage."
And that was at the soul of yesterday's contest. Donegal wanted this Ulster final so much, it pained and possibly paralysed them. Armagh made it look so fascinatingly simple, like Peter Cushing draining the blood from a virgin. They were sleek and tough and voraciously hungry for anything that moved, even after the life had gone from the game.
From Stevie McDonnell's second-minute point, a thing of economy and beauty, they never looked back. Diarmuid Marsden rose to fist a floating free from Oisín McConville into Donegal's net on 28 minutes and before the break, Paddy McKeever hit two points to leave Donegal hanging by a thread.
Brian McEniff's boys played valiantly after the break but deep down they must have known. Sometimes football can be cruel. It was no surprise when Paddy McKeever bore down on goal, after a slick pass from McDonnell, to leave it at 2-12 to 0-10.
"Just a simple one-two, I suppose it was like something from an under-14 game," McKeever remembered afterwards. "It was the timing that made it look easy."
And that was the truth. Armagh's timing was perfect, with Francie Bellew and Kieran Hughes leading a defensive challenge that hustled Donegal's forward line into oblivion. Adrian Sweeney was retired early, Christy Toye carted off to hospital.
"We did not match them for hunger or passion today," said Brian McEniff later. "Armagh were quite awesome."
So they were. The last 10 minutes were just merciless, with McConville, inevitably, breaking loose to chip Armagh's third goal with a movement so deft and effortless it was like the matador's final thrust. He wheeled away and the sky above Croke Park reflected orange and minutes later, Kieran McGeeney was back on the podium.
Geyser. Wasn't he meant to be the forgotten man? The defender has had his travails but leaders do not simply disappear.
"You have to keep the head down," he said in the tunnel as the cheering continued. "It's a great thing for humility to learn that when you are not there, the team still exists." And the more we keep doubting them, the better they exist.
