Ulster SFC semi-final: Derry v Monaghan (Saturday, 5pm, Healy Park, live on GAAGO)
LOOK back at everything you thought you knew about last summer’s meeting of Derry and Monaghan.
A brilliant first half from Derry, devastating attacking play, goals, with enough to fend off the Monaghan recovery.
It was fairly comfortable and comprehensive for the eventual Ulster champions.
That about sum it up?
Stats can make lies of most of what the human eye thinks it sees.
Buried deep in the analysis of it are revealing particles.
For instance, Monaghan had 48 attacks to Derry’s 27. The shot count was 37-20. Monaghan scored 17 times to Derry’s 15.
The beaten side won 80 per cent of Rory Beggan’s kickouts. Derry won just 58 per cent of their own.
If you threw a blanket over the scoreboard and wheeled out Les Dennis to ask 100 people who they thought had won that game based on those statistics, they’d all be legally obliged to say Monaghan.
But their performance was typical of their championship displays in the last three years. Terrible first half, defiantly brilliant second half.
The Ulster final of 2021, the Derry game in ’22 and the Tyrone game two weeks ago all followed a template they’d rather not use.
Whatever about the other two, the first half of last year’s game was a tactical disaster in every sense.
They left a huge gaping space down the middle of their defence. Derry, particularly Gareth McKinless, ran rampantly through it.
Look at the match-ups. Dessie Ward on Shane McGuigan. Micheal Bannigan on Ethan Doherty. Ryan McAnespie picking up Conor Doherty rather than Gareth McKinless, who was too physically powerful for Shane Carey.
They couldn’t have got it much more wrong if they’d tried.
Vinny Corey was part of that management team. Since stepping up, he has already proven himself very capable at this level.
But as much as he corrected it to great effect after half an hour, they also got their match-ups badly wrong at the start against Tyrone two weeks ago.
They can’t afford another repeat.
Picking their team this week would not have been easy. Suddenly they look overloaded with defensive options.
Karl O’Connell was outstanding against Tyrone. He has to start.
Dessie Ward came on at the very end of that game, suggesting he’ll be fit.
Conor McCarthy’s move back to wing-back, where he’d played for a lot of the last two years, was transformative for both him and the team.
Kieran Hughes and Shane Carey were both excellent off the bench, though are unlikely to start here.
The get-out is to play with seven defenders, if you count McCarthy at wing-back.
It means O’Connell starting in place of Thomas McPhillips, who had a good maiden league campaign but struggled with Darragh Canavan.
That Monaghan came from five down at half-time to beat Tyrone owed a lot to their lesser lights. Conor McManus’ frees were huge but to see them win such a big game when they didn’t have Darren Hughes or Jack McCarron on song, no Dessie Ward on the field, Niall Kearns and Ryan McAnespie gone, that had to be the most heartening thing of all.
McAnespie has returned home in recent days and will almost certainly be part of their summer, but you won’t see him this weekend.
Kearns is a big loss too. Their recovery in the second half last year was built on him taking command of his titanic battle with Conor Glass.
Is there some correlation between the impact from subs and the amount of game time they get?
Derry have scored just 0-4 off their bench, and two of those points came in the win over Dublin in Celtic Park. Their subs get an average of 12 minutes on the pitch.
Monaghan’s bench, which they haven’t been afraid to turn to early in games, has contributed 1-10 off an average of 20 minutes per player.
Fermanagh were effectively beaten inside 13 minutes in Brewster Park. Any analysis on it would be facile beyond noting how easily their prised the Erne defence apart when they attempted to effectively go man-to-man.
The stuff about Derry struggling under the high ball maybe has some merit but not anywhere near as much as is being suggested. The common denominator in their concession of goals has been the withdrawal of Conor Glass.
In the 39 minutes where he was fit in the league final, Derry kept Dublin to 0-4. In the 31 minutes he was either on the ground or off the field, they conceded 4-2.
Fermanagh had 0-6 when he went off after 40 minutes. Thereafter they plundered 2-2.
There is so much less between Derry and Monaghan than last year’s first half suggests.
If Monaghan can get their match-ups right and not find themselves still standing at the bottom of the mountain after 20 minutes looking up at Derry steaming away again, they’ll have a great shot.
Whether they have the attacking quality to unpick a much better defensive setup than the Tyrone one they found ways through is the eternal question.
McCarron and McManus were quiet last year and won’t have much space to avail of. Karl Gallagher isn’t a big scorer. Conor McCluskey is perfect for Stephen O’Hanlon, although Conor Meyler was the last day too and the Carrickmacross man was fit for that.
They’re too wildly unpredictable to confidently back against a team the polar opposite of unpredictable.
Derry are the best side in the province at the minute. And what they’re best at is showing up pretty much all the time.
Derry get the nod simply because you can rely on them.
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KEY BATTLE: Dessie Ward v Ethan Doherty
VIRTUALLY nothing happens in Derry’s attack these days without it going through Ethan Doherty’s hands. It’s almost like some sort of training game where he has to touch the ball before his team can score. You’re looking at it like this – would Doherty get into the Kerry team, the Dublin team, the Galway team? You’d think he’d get into all three. He assisted for 2-2 in this fixture last year, when he was up against Karl O’Connell. In Ward, provided he’s fit, he’ll come up against one of Ulster’s most diligent swatters. Nullifying Doherty could go a long way if he can manage it.
TACTICAL TAKE
Monaghan: Vinny Corey has had a really tough job this week. The impacts made by all of Karl O’Connell, Kieran Hughes and Shane Carey off the bench against Tyrone, the performance drawn out of Conor McCarthy by his positional switch and the likely return of Dessie Ward means a serious headache. O’Connell, despite not being named to, you’d think has to start after a brilliant performance. Do they retain McCarthy at wing-back, where he had been for most of the last two years and where he hurt Tyrone from when he returned there? If Ward’s fit, he plays. Kieran Hughes is only back so probably isn’t ready for 70 minutes, whereas Corey will recall Carey’s struggle in this fixture last year. After a good league, Thomas McPhillips had a difficult championship debut and could start from the bench. They got their team and their match-ups so badly wrong in this fixture last year that it effectively cost them the game. Monaghan were so open at the back and Derry’s runners cut them for decisive goals. That can’t happen again.
Derry: What really ever changes for Derry? When you talk about match-ups, you have to credit Rory Gallagher and Ciaran Meenagh for how seldom they get theirs wrong. Last year they sprung a surprise by putting Padraig McGrogan on Conor McManus, while Conor McCluskey on Kieran Hughes wouldn’t have been obvious beforehand, but both really paid off. Eoin McEvoy forcing his way in and Padraig Cassidy’s return to full fitness and form has squeezed Benny Heron out of the team in recent weeks. Gallagher has a deep trust in McEvoy already. The young Magherafelt man was superb against Fermanagh. Where Derry profited on Monaghan’s tactical catastrophe in last year’s first half, the second half was a completely different game. The big difference is that Brendan Rogers has since moved into a midfield area that was overtaken by the now-absent Niall Kearns that day. The risky positioning of Odhran Lynch on kickouts was something Fermanagh came close to exploiting by kicking the ball on top of him rather than avoiding the 2v1. Derry won most of them but when they didn’t, the threat to their goal was very real.