DONEGAL will leave no stone unturned in their quest to reach an All-Ireland Senior Championship final this year after their empathic Ulster final victory over Monaghan on Sunday.
Those were the words of manager Michéal Naughton and the manner in which they collected their second senior provincial title in three years defeating the holders 4-11 to 0-15 in St Tiernach’s Park, Clones who would argue against the Tir Chonail girls reaching the Croke Park decider on the fourth Sunday in September.
Naughton made it very clear that his side had set out a number of goals for 2017 and he made no bones about it when he mentioned reaching the All-Ireland final in a few months time not an hour after he collected his first Ulster senior title as a manager.
“Our first goal this year was to keep our division one status and we did that, and we did it in style and we were probably a bit disappointed we lost to Cork as we had them on the ropes that day,” said Naughton.
“Our second goal was to win an Ulster title and we have that done and our third goal is to be in Croke Park on All-Ireland final day and we will do everything, we will leave no stone unturned, to make sure that we are there.”
Donegal certainly are the in-form team in the country at the moment, especially with reigning All-Ireland champions Cork failing to make the Munster provincial final. They were many people’s favourites for the 2017 Ulster title and they did not disappoint with a superb all-round team performance and while captain Geraldine McLaughlin may have scored over half of her side’s total - 2-6 - Naughton was quick to praise his defence who kept the Monaghan attack very quiet. He knew it would take a very good team to stop his side on Sunday and not for the first time this year, his players showed him they could put in that winning performance.
“We know what we are capable of and if we play to our potential it takes a very good team to beat us. We got off to a good start and that is what we worked on all week and we talked about and we knew that we had the match-ups for the players.
“We have some talent there and Treasa Doherty did a massive job on Ciara McAnespie and Eimear Gallagher did a huge job on Caoimhe Mohan. We got our match-ups right; Aoife Mc[Donnell] on Cora Courtney. The was just basically a great team performance, [they] showed great hunger and great heart and I am just delighted for these bunch of girls.
“We knew if we ran at Monaghan we could open them up and we opened them up in style.”
The goals were crucial and it was Donegal who bagged all four in the game and where they looked like scoring more, Monaghan were the opposite as Donegal shut up shop in defence, getting numbers behind the ball and attacking at pace with McLaughlin and Yvonne McMonagle the key targets up in the forward line. At half-time, Monaghan were still in the game despite trailing 3-4 to 0-8 and a good start to the second half was crucial if they were to have any chance of retaining their title. However, Donegal and McLaughlin had other ideas and within five minutes of the resumption, the Termon player had the ball in the back of the net in a killer blow for Monaghan they they could never recover from. That was a crucial turning point in the game for Naughton.
“We talked in the dressing room at half-time about the first 10 to 15 minutes and we knew that if we came out and took it to them we would kill the game off. Basically, that is what we did. We came out and Geraldine stuck the ball in the net in the first five minutes of the second half and that was a huge, huge turning point.
“We knew Monaghan had to come at us and we talked about keeping the goals out and that if we did that we would go on and win this game. Our defence, what can you say, they harassed, they put hands in, they put heads in, it really was a huge, huge team effort and I think it was the hunger and the little bit more want that wins games and I think we had that today.”
Donegal now patiently wait on the All-Ireland Qualifiers to get underway and they will not begin their All-Ireland campaign until mid August in the quarter-finals. For Monaghan, as beaten finalists it is the qualifier route. Already there are Armagh and Cavan, champions Cork, Kildare and Laois with these five teams in the hat for the first draw.
Two teams will play each other in the preliminary round with the winner going forward to play a provincial championship runner-up with the remaining three teams to be drawn against one of the remaining provincial championship runners up. They will all learn their fate in the draw being held in Croke Park this evening.
