Preview: All-Ireland SFC final
The Sam Maguire Cup. Photo by Sam Barnes/Sportsfile
Sunday July 27
All-Ireland SFC Final
Kerry v Donegal, Croke Park, 3.30pm, RTE/BBC
Writing in the 2014 All-Ireland SFC final match programme, Oisin McConville predicted a Kerry win, 'by a point or two'.
That was when Kerry and Donegal last met in an All-Ireland final and Armagh great McConville, a winner in 2002, got it just about spot on. Kerry won a tight game by three.
Over a decade on, a lot of the points that McConville made back then in his match preview could be applied all over again.
Donegal, he said at the time, will have 'their usual defensive structure', Kerry will 'push up on kick-outs' and with towering targetman Kieran Donaghy stationed in attack, 'you don't have to be Einstein to work out the tactics there'.
The Donegal of 2025 are renowned for their defensive excellence too, Kerry still enjoy putting a boa constrictor-like squeeze on the opposition's kick-out while you could substitute David Clifford for Donaghy, an equally powerful and outrageously gifted forward who Kerry will look to get on the ball at every opportunity.
Similarities with 11 years ago are to be expected, of course, as Jim McGuinness was in charge of Donegal then and now.
In between, soccer coaching took the former midfielder on a world tour, from Scotland to China and on to the US, but the Glenties man returned to the Donegal hotseat ahead of the 2024 season and has engineered a quite remarkable turnaround.
The parallels with his first stint in charge of Donegal are eerily similar. He picked Donegal up off the floor after initially taking over for 2011, promptly won back-to-back Ulster titles and after losing an All-Ireland semi-final in 2011 made it to the final in 2012 and won it.
Donegal manager Jim McGuinness speaks to his team. Photo by Daire Brennan/Sportsfile
His second spell as manager also began with Donegal in a difficult position - Down knocked them out of Ulster in 2023 and Tyrone beat them comfortably in an All-Ireland preliminary quarter-final - but he has once again engineered back-to-back provincial title successes across 2024 and 2025.
And after reaching the 2024 All-Ireland semi-final, he has gone a step further in 2025. If Donegal win on Sunday, 2024 and 2025 will be a carbon copy of 2011 and 2012.
Michael Murphy was captain in 2012, and again in 2014, and plucking him from retirement for the 2025 season has paid off. The big Glenswilly full-forward has delivered beyond all expectations and is in Footballer of the Year form. McGuinness got Ryan McHugh back for 2024 after taking a season out too.
He identified Finbarr Roarty as a rising star defender while Patrick McBrearty, so influential as an impact sub in recent games, noted after the All-Ireland semi-final defeat of Meath that McGuinness also got Odhran McFadden-Ferry, Eoin McHugh and Eoin McGettigan back in and contributing strongly to the panel.
McGuinness, you suspect, has this Donegal group just where he wants them; fully focused, united and firing on all cylinders.
Of their 10 Championship games this season, losing an All-Ireland SFC group opener to Tyrone has been their only blip. Their ability to overwhelm teams with powerful running, from all angles, their ultra intensity and aerial ability was best displayed in their second-half performance against Monaghan in the All-Ireland quarter-final.
"They penned us in, we couldn't get out," lamented Monaghan manager Gabriel Bannigan afterwards, wincing after watching a seven-point half-time lead for Monaghan turn into a six-point win for Donegal.
The O'Donnells, Conor and Shane, were terrific that day and have been all season. Oisin Gallen arguably put in his best display of the campaign against Meath last time out. Ciaran Thompson is metronomically efficient and a considerable two-point threat while Murphy pulls it all together as only he can.
Behind them, Michael Langan and Hugh McFadden in the midfield can do it whichever way you please, silk or steel.
Roarty and Brendan McCole are a couple of limpet-like tight-marking backs with high skill sets and clever football brains. Throw in power runners from the back like Peadar Mogan, Ryan McHugh and Ciaran Moore, and with Shaun Patton firing darts to them all off the tee, and you have a team terrifically crafted.
All of which will be music to the ears of Jack O'Connor. Anyone writing off the Championship's most successful ever county does so at their peril. The Kerry manager is preparing for an eighth All-Ireland senior final in what is his third stint as senior boss. He has previously masterminded Sam Maguire Cup wins in 2004, 2006, 2009 and 2022, coming up just shy in 2005, 2011 and 2023.
David Clifford remains his and Kerry's trump card, the wonderfully gifted Fossa phenom who, even by his standards, is in the form of his career, averaging out at almost 10 points per Championship game this term.
David Clifford of Kerry enters the arena for the second-half of the All-Ireland SFC semi-final against Tyrone. Photo by Ramsey Cardy/Sportsfile
The expectation is that McCole will mark Clifford. But there are other elements required to stop Clifford, like winning the middle third battle and cutting off the supply line. That means trying to get on top of Kerry's in-form midfielder Joe O'Connor and containing the fire that the Kingdom were able to whip up in that general area against Tyrone and Armagh. Their appetite for destruction in those two games in particular was there for all to see.
O'Connor has named an unchanged team, as have Donegal, so there's Paudie Clifford to contend with too. A creator supreme with ice in his veins. And don't forget Sean O'Shea who reminded us in the Armagh game in particular just why he's regarded as one of the forwards of his generation.
Kerry stacked up the two-pointers that day. They only got one last time out, against Tyrone, and, like Donegal, haven't tended to chase points from outside the arc. If they were to do so again this time, that could spook a Donegal side that coughed up four in the first-half to Monaghan last month. Or at least drag their defensive line out a little and, perhaps, create openings for goals.
Much will come down to Kerry's defence and how an experienced group - Paul Murphy started the 2014 final too and is still going strong - cope with all of Donegal's threats. Kerry have conceded an average of 21.5 points per game in the Championship, Donegal 19.
Goalkeeper Shane Ryan's two-footedness, and speed of thought, gives him a great chance of mixing up his kick-outs for Kerry, short and long, left and right.
Throw in the potential impact of two excellent benches - midfielder Diarmuid O'Connor is available again for Kerry after a shoulder injury and listed among the substitutes, as is 2014 final goalscorer Paul Geaney - and you have a glorious conundrum. It could go any way and it will be fascinating.
KERRY: Shane Ryan; Paul Murphy, Jason Foley, Dylan Casey; Brian O Beaglaoich, Mike Breen, Gavin White; Sean O'Brien, Mark O'Shea; Joe O'Connor, Sean O'Shea, Graham O'Sullivan; David Clifford, Paudie Clifford, Dylan Geaney.
Subs: Shane Murphy, Killian Spillane, Evan Looney, Tom Leo O'Sullivan, Tadhg Morley, Paul Geaney, Micheal Burns, Tony Brosnan, Armin Heinrich, Tomas Kennedy, Diarmuid O'Connor.
DONEGAL: Shaun Patton; Finbarr Roarty, Brendan McCole, Peadar Mogan; Ryan McHugh, Eoghan Ban Gallagher, Caolan McColgan; Hugh McFadden, Michael Langan; Shane O'Donnell, Ciaran Thompson, Ciaran Moore; Conor O'Donnell, Michael Murphy, Oisin Gallen.
Subs: Gavin Mulreany, Stephen McMenamin, Odhran McFadden Ferry, Eoin McHugh, Caolan McGonagle, Aaron Doherty, Patrick McBrearty, Jamie Brennan, Niall O'Donnell, Daire O Baoill, Jason McGee.
