Ulster SFC quarter-final: Tyrone 1-18 Monaghan 2-17
OF all the colour this rivalry has given to Ulster football in the last decade, none was nearly so vivid as this.
In a tale of All-Ireland semi-finals, quarter-finals, Ulster finals, there are wins that have meant more, but mostly they’ve been owned by Tyrone when they have.
For Monaghan this was hugely significant. Psychologically, to come back from the first half they came back from was typical of their last few years.
The second half against Derry last year, they were completely dominant but left it too late.
The Ulster final in 2021 was exactly the same. Tyrone were stripped bare but got out alive and went on to win an All-Ireland.
What becomes of either team’s summer beyond this afternoon is unclear, because it was not flawless. It was far from it at times. But it was always joyful and so uncharacteristically open.
Tyrone’s line-up suggested a defensive approach but the reality was nothing like it. Frank Burns and Michael O’Neill played in the half-forward positions the numbers on their backs suggested.
It was man-for-man stuff for almost its entirety. In the first half, Tyrone made hay off it.
Vinny Corey might admit to the error in his match-ups. His two most inexperienced defenders, Ryan O’Toole and Thomas McPhillips, went in one-to-one against Darren McCurry and Darragh Canavan respectively.
By the time they changed it, Canavan had 1-4 to his name, McCurry had a point and a direct hand in another four. Tyrone led by five when the goal went in, a McCurry-Canavan combination after they’d stripped a short kickout in the corner, and continued to lead by five at the interval.
Nothing really suggested that was about to change.
But Monaghan got a ligature tied around it. At 1-8 to 0-6 down, the change was made. McPhillips, excellent through the league, had a sobering first championship start. Ryan Wylie went back on McCurry, O’Toole switched to Canavan and Conor McCarthy went to wing-back, from where he was arguably the game’s best player thereafter. It all had such a transformative effect.
O’Toole’s difficult opening 25 minutes would soon disappear. He had kicked Monaghan’s first score and would go on to close Canavan down almost completely, barring one routine point the Errigal Ciaran man kicked falling over off-balance into the wind from the wrong side.
When O’Toole sneaked right in behind on Kieran Duffy’s pass in the sixth minute of six added minutes, the obvious thing to do was to fist it over the bar and add another 20 minutes to the clock.
Instead, he put his head down and drilled it right through the invisible gap between Niall Morgan’s legs.
Tyrone looked to have won it seconds earlier when Darren McCurry swung over in a frantic scramble of bodies after Brian Kennedy somehow wasn’t given a free with the jersey half over his head.
There were calls on both sides that wouldn’t withstand great scrutiny. Both sides had penalty claims, Monaghan’s the stronger when Karl Gallagher was grappled by Cormac Quinn early in the second half. Gallagher’s honesty in keeping his feet cost him.
But to quibble over the refereeing would be to disservice a contest that offered far more than most would have expected of it.
The attendance of 10,067 was a full five-thousand down (50 per cent) on the last time these two met in Omagh five years ago, a nod towards the new format and the lack of recognition of it in terms of ticket prices.
Dressed in any other summer’s clothes, this would have been called a classic. Time might be kinder to this summer’s provincial series than we think and offer it the tag anyway.
Having looked wide to the world early on, Monaghan tightened up defensively with the switches.
It took Tyrone sixteen minutes of the second half to get a score at all and beyond Ronan McNamee slipping in behind only to be denied by Rory Beggan’s knees, the goal threat completely dissipated.
Darren Hughes had uncharacteristically struggled with the outstanding Brian Kennedy. Hughes’ injury, sustained in a three-way clash early in the second half, forced him off. His brother Kieran came in and had a huge impact on the last half hour as well.
It wasn’t so much that Tyrone died or capitulated or any of it. They kept on doing what they’d been doing, stayed with the same front-foot approach. But once Monaghan got their house in order, the same defensive flaws of that aggressive Tyrone setup that had been seen in the league re-emerged.
The only day in recent memory that Monaghan have registered a score resembling 2-18 in a serious championship game was the famous 2021 semi-final with Armagh, when they hit 4-17. The Orchard were panned for their approach that day.
That’s the gig. For a half everything worked beautifully for Tyrone. McCurry and Canavan were class. Padraig Hampsey, Ronan McNamee and Michael McKernan were comfortable against Jack McCarron, Conor McManus and Micheal Bannigan respectively.
To their end, that remained so. McCarron was taken off after 54 minutes. McNamee remained resolute on McManus, but the Clontibret man wouldn’t leave without impacting.
He had kicked one superb first-half score from the wrong side but coming down the home straight he was the same clutch player at 35 that he was at 25.
His free to put them 1-17 to 1-16 ahead in stoppage time looked made for Rory Beggan, but McManus took command and landed it from a position he had no right to score from.
Sludden levels, McCurry drives the place half insane thinking they've got out of it, and then O'Toole pops up to take it away.
There’s so much to pore over that you could never get through it all. The microcosmic battle of Stephen O’Hanlon and Conor Meyler, won by the Tyrone man in the first half and then by O’Hanlon in the second, mostly on the back of his brilliant goal that shot a thunderbolt of new life into the contest.
Mattie Donnelly landing three points (you’d wonder why he was taken off), Brian Kennedy’s brilliance, the influence of both goalkeepers, the big final 20 minutes from Karl Gallagher to keep giving Rory Beggan the outlet they needed.
It was just terrific stuff.
Monaghan stay standing, and we all stay wondering where Tyrone are really at.
MATCH STATS
Tyrone: N Morgan (0-1 free); R McNamee, P Hampsey; C Meyler (0-2), M McKernan, C Quinn; B Kennedy, P Harte, C Kilpatrick (0-1); F Burns, M O’Neill, M Donnelly (0-3), D Canavan (1-5, 0-1 free), K McGeary; D McCurry (0-5, 0-3 frees)
Subs: J Oguz for O’Neill (45), N Sludden (0-1) for McGeary (60), R Canavan for Donnelly (60), M McGleenan for Burns (65), C Munroe for McKernan (72)
Monaghan: R Beggan; R O’Toole (1-1); R Wylie, C Boyle, K Duffy (0-1), T McPhillips, K O’Connell; D Hughes, K Gallagher, K Lavelle; S O’Hanlon (0-1), M Bannigan (0-1), C McCarthy (0-2); J McCarron (0-2 frees), C McManus (0-9, 0-8 frees)
Subs: S Carey (0-1) for McPhillips (33), K Hughes for D Hughes (41), S Jones for McCarron (54), D Ward for O’Connell (77), F Kelly for O’Toole (77)
Referee: N Cullen (Fermanagh)
Attendance: 10,067
