Where did it all go wrong for Donegal?

Donegal's season collapsed against Mayo, and with it much of their aura of invincibility, but they will be back, writes Michael Hannon.

The All Ireland quarter-finals played over the bank holiday weekend offered us plenty of entertainment. It was great to have more than just a passing interest in them this year with Cavan playing at this stage for the first time since the backdoor system was introduced.
Since the games have been played however, there has been much to digest, with the Mayo v Donegal game raising many questions about the current hierarchy of counties in Gaelic football.
First of all, the display given by Mayo’s Aidan O’Shea was so utterly dominant that it was a pleasure to have been there to witness it in the flesh. The fact that his team-mate Cillian O’Connor had just scored three goals and four points, all bar one point from play, and yet still wasn’t close to being in the running for man of the match, only illustrates the heights that O’Shea managed to hit during his own personal tour de force on Sunday afternoon.
When everything had subsided though the questions that kept coming back to me was this: how far have Donegal regressed in the last 10 months, or have Mayo really made a quantum leap forward?
Realisitically it’s near impossible for a team already operating at the upper echelons of their sport, like Mayo have been for the past three years, to suddenly see a massive improvement. It’s much more likely that any improvements made at that level are marginal, bit-by-bit, little by little.
The last few inches of the ascent to All Ireland glory are the hardest earned. So while the plaudits for the performance and victory quite rightly go to James Horan’s men, the more interesting team to analyse has to be the dethroned Ulster and All Ireland champions, Donegal.

Fall from grace
Where did it all go wrong? For a team that was being heralded as the fittest, most tactically tuned, and one of the most mentally strong ever assembled in Gaelic football, their fall from grace has been exceptional.
All Ireland champions struggle to repeat their level of performance in the wake of winning the title. Kerry in 2007 being the only team of the last 22 years to achieve back to back titles, but they were helped by the introduction of a new manager which kept everyone on their toes.
For Donegal, the All Ireland champions, to find themselves as they did at one point against Mayo, 22 points in arrears with over 25 minutes to play? Well it beggars belief and only further highlights the spectacular nature of their fall. You have to start by giving credit, and lots of it, to Jim McGuinness and Rory Gallagher for the job they did in 2012.
They quite rightly got a lot of credit at the time, but in hindsight they probably didn’t get enough. What they achieved with that Donegal team represents arguably the best coaching and management job ever-completed anywhere in Gaelic football. They effectively won a senior all Ireland with a panel of 19 players. It’s hard to fathom but it’s true.  Everyone knows that strong panels do well. It’s not just about having the five subs to bring on during match day, it’s about the nature and intensity of your training. Thirty players of a high standard are going to make sure your training games are so much more intense than if there are only 25 good lads with a drop in standard to the last five.
By having his team so well tuned to their system of play it meant that an ordinary player was suddenly much more than the sum of his parts.

Injuries
This year they have struggled with injuries. Certain players have been playing every game but look like they’ve been doing so within themselves. When this is the situation you usually find that from Monday to Sunday their ability to partake fully in training is severely hampered as they get wrapped in cotton wool for the games.
Anthony Thompson for example did not perform at the level that he did for the previous two years. To me anyway, he looked hampered this year by a hamstring injury whenever he ran. It was most notable when trying to solo the ball.
So what happens when it hurts to run? You run less. Simple really. And he wasn’t alone. Frank McGlynn has been injured, concussed and hampered by dodgy hamstrings at various stages this season. His marauding runs of last year were less frequent. Karl Lacey has been injured on and off for almost 10 months.
Even when he played against Monaghan this year he rarely tried to replicate the way he played last year, similarly on his introduction against Mayo.

Shots
Last year Donegal managed to create 85 shots in the Ulster Championship excluding the preliminary round. With so many men back behind the ball they relied on players breaking hard. This year they only managed to create 57. Less men breaking, or the guys doing the breaking were lesser players.
Either way you look at it only serves as a reminder; Donegal’s victory in 2012 was achieved by one of the shallowest panels of any top level Gaelic football team.
And what of all the verbal warfare that had preceded their championship encounter against Mayo? James Horan going into that fixture should have been the man under most pressure, there’s a growing expectation that anything less than Sam Maguire will represent failure for Mayo this year. If anything though, it seemed it was the Donegal management who was feeling the strain.
Since Mark McHugh’s injury in the Ulster final McGuinness has seemed over protective of his players.
There appears to be a deep rooted belief that his key players are being targeted for special attention. He might have a case too, dating all the way back to 2011’s semi-final when Karl Lacey was taken out of it during the clash with Dublin. Any attempt to take the high road on this issue has been eroded by Internet enthusiasts who scoured YouTube for clips of McGuinness clipping one player after another during his own storied football career. Even still, McGuinness had legitmate concerns.
With only a few key players in his system he has to protect them as much as possible. Once Eamon McGee stamped on the neck of Enda Varley and received his marching orders the player had just effectively undermined his manager’s argument, not just for this year, but for future years.

Aura of invincibility
The aura of invincibility that had surrounded them was being wiped away. Relegation in the league. Down going toe to toe with them for 70 minutes. Monaghan beating them on Ulster final day. Laois sticking with them for much longer than anyone had predicted, and now Mayo were leading them by a whopping 20 points.
McGee has endured a horrible summer himself by comparison to last year’s standards. His actions when he stamped on Varley were the build up of three months of frustration. He needed a mental break as much as a physical break. They all do. And now they’re going to get it.
In the days after the defeat McFadden noticeably came out and stated emphatically he would not be retiring. While most players would take some time to consider their options he decided to let it be known that he was going nowhere. I expect McGuinness, Gallagher and everyone else involved to follow suit.
There is probably one more year in this Donegal group. A proper pre-season to sort out all their injuries, one or two of the younger players like Ryan McHugh develops a little bit more, and suddenly they’re stronger than they were in 2012.  Yes they just got humiliated in Croke Park, but for various reason they were not near their best, and hadn’t been all year. Write them off at your peril.