Sport

Ryan McHugh hails Paddy McGrath and Donegal's strength-in-depth

Donegal Ryan McHugh leaves Tomas McCann and Mark Sweeney of Antrim behind Picture by Margaret McLaughlin
Donegal Ryan McHugh leaves Tomas McCann and Mark Sweeney of Antrim behind Picture by Margaret McLaughlin Donegal Ryan McHugh leaves Tomas McCann and Mark Sweeney of Antrim behind Picture by Margaret McLaughlin

Ulster Senior Football Championship quarter-final: Donegal 3-19 Antrim 1-9

SQUAD strength, young players making debuts, scores from a wide range of players, and plenty to improve on: almost the perfect day for Donegal seniors.

Add in one of their greatest servants opening his Championship scoring account and it’s no wonder that half-forward Ryan McHugh was in happy mood afterwards.

Paddy McGrath was the man who broke his scoring duck – with a goal to boot – as Donegal ran riot in the second period, and McHugh was delighted the Ardara man finally troubled the scorers after stopping so many scores over the years:

“I was chatting to him in the dressing room there, he was saying it was his first ever score for Donegal in Championship.

“It was great to see – Paddy’s a phenomenal player, he’s a huge leader for us. Every day he goes to training he’s the hardest-working player at training, it’s great for Paddy to get on the scoreboard.”

Plenty of other Donegal players got on the score-sheet too, including a few off the bench, and that depth of quality is something that could prove important against tougher opposition than Antrim, believes McHugh.

As this reporter hesitated in recalling the subs brought on – ‘Paddy McBrearty, Mark [McHugh], Eoin [McHugh]…’ – Ryan completed it as quickly as he usually finishes off a scoring chance:

“Karl Lacey, Martin McElhinney, Michael Langan. Yeah, you need it – look no further than Dublin, the subs that they bring on every day, the impact that they make on games, other teams are starting to develop that too.

“It’s a 20-, 21-man game and we’re going to need that throughout the summer.

“Dublin, Kerry, Mayo, Tyrone, Monaghan all have that. Donegal need that – and thankfully we do have that at the minute.”

That squad strength has been boosted by the talented new blood, with first Ulster starts for Eoghan Gallagher, Caolan Ward, Jason McGee, Ciaran Thompson, Michael Carroll, and Jamie Brennan, and McHugh – at the ripe old age of 22 himself – reckoned they coped admirably:

“Any Championship match is going to be difficult, there were nerves there this morning, but I thought they did great.

“They’ve really been great for us this year, they’ve really pushed everyone on. They’re really pushing for jerseys – the boys that started did well and the boys that came off the bench did well, so we’re developing a squad in Donegal. You need that in Championship football, we’re getting there slowly but surely…

“Myself, Michael Murphy, Neil McGee, Karl Lacey, Frank McGlynn, all the other boys are fighting for spots on the team. Nobody deserves a spot on this Donegal team and that’s a good way to have it.”

The amount of newcomers to Championship perhaps played a part in Donegal’s nervy start – indeed McHugh acknowledged they might have gone in at half-time behind, but Antrim’s Matthew Fitzpatrick spurned a goal chance shortly before Brennan netted:

“Football’s like that, it can change on anything at all. I think we actually lost the ball at the start of the move, Jason McGee lost it, but he showed great determination to turn it over again, we got up the pitch, and Jamie finished it excellently – it was a huge score for us.

“Not unlike the Monaghan-Fermanagh game, it was an extremely tight first half. I thought we were lucky enough to go in as much ahead as we did. Antrim had a few goal chances which they could easily have stuck in the back of the net. We were delighted to go in at half-time in the lead.

“We really picked it up in the second half but going into the next game, against Derry or Tyrone, we’re really going to have to play for 70 minutes.”

Even so, McHugh accepted that Donegal were very impressive overall: “The first half was a wee bit of a negative. We gave away a few goal-scoring chances that we’d be disappointed about, gave away easy shooting opportunities that other team will take.

“But the second half was a huge positive…We re-grouped at half-time, assessed things, and really put in a top class performance”.