Gaelic Games

Canavans wreak havoc on Donegal as Tyrone make last eight

Ruairi and Darragh, sons of Peter Canavan, score 1-6 in Ballybofey in easy Tyrone victory

Tyrone’s Ruari Canavan. Photograph: James Crombie/Inpho

Chris McNulty
Sun Jun 25 2023 - 12:00
All-Ireland SFC preliminary quarter-final: Donegal 0-13 Tyrone 1-18

Tyrone are only getting motoring, but Donegal are out of road and the Championship after a relatively tepid derby in Ballybofey.

Canavans – yes, two of them – were to the fore as Tyrone earned a fine derby win over Donegal to seal a place in the All-Ireland SFC quarter-finals.

Ruairi Canavan scored the goal barely 90 seconds in and Darragh Canavan hit five points. The genes of ‘Peter The Great’ continue to bear fruit in the O’Neill County.

“They have good enough breeding anyway and that’s a start,” Mattie Donnelly said of his fellow forwards. “They are their own fellas and they bring the confidence with them. They bring that to training every night and it is exciting. Everyone is very excited and they bring a lot of energy with them.”

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Energy had been lacking six days prior when Tyrone were thankful that John Heslin’s crosshairs were just a little off. Had they been on the money, Westmeath and not Tyrone would’ve been jousting in the preliminary quarter-finals.

Now though, Tyrone, the Sam Maguire winners just two years ago, move on with a growing menace.

“Our lads have plenty of resilience and character,” joint manager Feargal Logan said. “They have really had serious comments made about a group that has won the All-Ireland in the past couple of years so let’s see how we get on from now.”

Tyrone wasted no time in laying down a marker in front of 11,971 and Ruairi Canavan netted from close range after Shaun Patton was unable to hold onto Darren McCurry’s long-range shot.

Donegal were stunned, but they had survived an earlier assault as Canavan fashioned his own chance but fired narrowly wide.

“You’re always hoping for goals and we could have had two,” Logan said. “Ruairi is fairly lively in there and he went at it hard. We were always conscious of that breeze. The crowd could have roared them to the line if they had got back a few more points.”

Donegal captain Patrick McBrearty spent four months sidelined with a hamstring injury and was elevated from the bench to start at the eleventh hour after Conor O’Donnell picked up an injury in the warm-up.

McBrearty had Donegal within two points in the 27th minute, but Tyrone hit five of the last seven points in the opening half and were 1-10 to 0-8 ahead at the break.

[ Conor McCarthy drills the winner as Monaghan outlast Kildare to reach All-Ireland quarter-final ]

At one stage in the second half, Tyrone led by double scores, 1-13 to 0-8, but Donegal found something and when Patton nailed a ‘45 seconds after Niall Morgan clawed around the post from a speculative Jason McGee shot.

Patton was firmly in the limelight in the closing chapter, seeing goal from a 50m free chalked off due to a square ball before being sent off after taking an apparent swipe at Michael McKernan.

Donnelly wonderfully arched over the final point of the night to seal a deserved eight-point win.

“This was a good game to get up for because of the rivalry,” Tyrone forward and man of the match Conor Meyler said. “We had been a bit flat. We just weren’t at it and lacked energy and zip against Westmeath. When we are at it, we are full on.”

Donegal’s season has been rather madcap, but Aidan O’Rourke steadied a ship that had seemed destined for the depths. Paddy Carr departed as manager just 149 days into his tenure with Donegal making the drop to Division 2.

Armagh native O’Rourke will now step away from the county, who seem set to be on the search for a new boss to lead them into 2024.

“It is absolutely a full-time job, managing an intercounty team,” he said. “You need a lot of time on your hands or to be retired to really do this properly. Gaelic games continue to evolve. The job of an intercounty manager is not one you can do part-time, to be sure.”

Donegal: S Patton (0-1 ‘45); M Curran, B McCole, C McColgan (0-1); C Ward, E Gallagher, S McMenamin; C McGonagle, H McFadden; D O Baoill, C Thompson (0-2), O Doherty (0-1); J Brennan, O Gallen (0-4), P McBrearty (0-3, 2f). Subs: J McGee for Doherty (half-time), L McGlynn (0-1) for O Baoill (43), R O’Donnell for McFadden (46), B O’Donnell for McColgan (61), G Mulreany for Curran (70+3).

Tyrone: N Morgan; M McKernan (0-2), R McNamee, P Hampsey; C Quinn, M O’Neill, P Harte; B Kennedy (0-1), C Kilpatrick (0-1); C Meyler, K McGeary, R Canavan (1-1); D McCurry (0-5, 4f), M Donnelly (0-3), D Canavan (0-5, 1f). Subs: F Burns for McGeary (56), R Donnelly for D. Canavan (61).

Referee: C Lane (Cork).

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