Football

Monaghan come out on top against champions Dublin

Monaghan's David Garland is taken down by Dublin's Jonny Cooper at Clones yesterday..Pic Philip Walsh.
Monaghan's David Garland is taken down by Dublin's Jonny Cooper at Clones yesterday..Pic Philip Walsh. Monaghan's David Garland is taken down by Dublin's Jonny Cooper at Clones yesterday..Pic Philip Walsh.

MONAGHAN had the chance to measure themselves against Dublin yesterday and the resilient Farneymen are looking down on the League and All-Ireland champions now after a deserved three-point win at Clones.

Trailing by six points in the first half and two at the interval, Monaghan registered second half goals through exciting debutant Stephen O’Hanlon and then Shane Carey and now sit joint top in the Division One standings.

It’s early days of course but wins over Dublin – albeit without several household names including Stephen Cluxton, James McCarthy and Ciaran Kilkenny - are always worth cherishing.

“Dublin are the benchmark for every team,” said O’Rourke.

“They lose very few games, even though it was the first game and they had a few of their first team players missing, we had a few missing as well.

“That has been the way most years, but even though they’ve had a few men missing they’ve always won the game.

“It was a chance for us to measure ourselves against them. It’s early on in the year but we’re delighted with the outcome. But look, that’s the thing about the League, it gives you two points, that’s all it does.

“We have six games left, so next week takes on added importance going away to Roscommon, if we get two points there it certainly gives us a great start.”

Dublin host Galway at Croke Park next Saturday night and manager Jim Gavin says his players – who looked uncharacteristically ragged towards the end of yesterday’s game – will have benefited from their first competitive clash of the yeat.

“I’m disappointed the result didn’t go our way but I’m really pleased with the endeavour of the Dublin players,” he said.

“We’re back just two weeks today so we’ve a lot of ground to catch up on other teams and obviously Monaghan have been doing a lot of work pre-season and it showed up towards the latter half of the game.

“But I thought it was a great workout for our guys and it will really bring us on over the next couple of weeks.”

John Small and Robert McDaid were both sin-binned yesterday and, while Gavin says he is “an advocate” of the new rule, he said the game turned on Small’s 10-minute dismissal and argued that it wasn’t a “textbook” black card offence.

“Monaghan are first and foremost, they are a really top class side,” he said.

“They were in the semi-final of the Championship last year, they've been really strong in Division One over the last few years and they were very impressive.”

Gavin added: “The black card, John Small's, probably had a big say in how momentum swung back towards Monaghan. Overall, from a Dublin perspective, have to be really pleased with the endeavour of the players.”