Monaghan to upset Louth's cosy familiarity with Croke Park
Declan Bogue
PREVIEWS. THERE WAS a time when they were a staple of the newspapers.
When honest working men might study the wisdom of the sheets and go on the hunches of the Gaelic Games writers of Ireland to stake a few quid on the likely winners across the weekend.
Such is the altered state of the All-Ireland football championship in 2026, that previews are now almost redundant. Shocks happen each and every weekend. Old Empires crumble, and new forces are emerging all the time.
Around a decade ago, I would sit down with a pencil and paper and sketch out the likely lune-ups of teams. Then I would do the likely match-ups, position by position and declare who might win the games within the game.
Add in a dash of guesswork over kickouts and the power of who was coming off the bench. Consider the previous league campaign. You had a fair idea. Enough to rustle up a confident prediction.
In this era of zonal marking, the two-point effect and the dangers of Big Momentum, that thinking is gone. League means nothing now when the make-up of the All-Ireland quarter finalists include three teams that played Division 2, and two that were relegated from Division 1.
All we have, as we turn our gaze to the meeting of Louth and Monaghan, are thoughts.
And one that immediately strikes is how, over time, Ger Brennan turned Louth into a Croke Park team. While Mickey Harte and Gavin Devlin reimagined the Wee County as one that could climb up the leagues, Brennan was the man who imparted so much Croke Park knowledge that they became intimately familiar with how Croke Park plays.
That knowledge has been built upon by Gavin Devlin now in sole charge.
The greatest example of this is in how they treated the two games against Dublin.
For the first game, a 0-20 to 0-10 win for Dublin in Portlaoise, Devlin went away from the process.
The team that largely played the league and beat Wexford was butchered. He made five changes for the Dublin game and was forced into a sixth when another player was lost during the warm-up.
He brought in Craig Lennon, Ryan Burns and Ciaran Downey, all of whom were making their way back from injury and were undercooked. Peader Ó Cofaigh-Byrne dominated the midfield up against the young and raw James Maguire.
Louth were favourites and this played in Dublin’s hands. With Brennan now – sort of – in charge of Dublin, they knew Louth didn’t like to keep the play wide and Dublin did this with Niall Scully acting as quarter-back and Sean MacMahon man-marking Sam Mulroy.
By the time they met again in Round 1 of the All-Ireland, Louth were a different animal. Croke Park would work to their advantage.
For the full-forward line, Devlin picked three candidates who are familiar with duties around the middle. James Maguire was switched to this position, and it paid off with two goals in a minute.
Conall McCaul and Kieran McArdle (with 1-1) were the others. Louth had a different approach, and it paid off as they reversed the result.
Sure, the win over Armagh was unexpected and glorious. There was a little bit gained from hosting the game in Inniskeen, when it might have suited Armagh better to have it in Croke Park. You do what you can, and that has suited Louth.
What’s starting at them from the other end is a team in Monaghan who defy anything that is throw at them.
If anyone could discount the league, it was Monaghan, shorn of almost a dozen regular players through injury. To Gabriel Bannigan’s credit, he never showed if any of this pressure was getting to him.
Their powers of recovery are now legion. From the Jack McCarron buzzer-beater in the Ulster semi-final against Derry to Rory Beggan’s two-point winner. From the glacial slow start against Armagh in the Ulster final to the subsequent fightback and dragging them into extra-time, their purple patches have been immense.
This is, however, their seventh game in 11 weeks.
It works both ways. They have lost players through injury, not least Bobby McCaul who was heroic against Mayo before he ruptured his cruciate.
It has also allowed others such as Conor McCarthy, after a brutal winter of trying to manage injury and Scotstown’s run to an All-Ireland semi-final, to thrive and find his best form.
Ryan Wylie has also nursed himself back in and Jack McCarron has delivered a serious consistency to his play.
The loss to Mayo has been followed with two wins that, while hardly straightforward, have brought decent winning margins against Roscommon (nine points) and Westmeath (seven points).
It brings the two teams back to the same position; Croke Park, with an All-Ireland semi-final dangling in front of them.
Fair to say in the midst of this crazy season, it’s a position beyond their dreams back in the chilly days of the league.
Verdict? Monaghan. Just about.
****
Check out the latest episode of The 42′s GAA Weekly podcast here
The 42
