When and where?
Donegal will play Kerry in the 2025 All-Ireland senior football championship final at Croke Park. Throw-in is on Sunday at 3.30pm.
Where can I watch?
You can watch the final on RTÉ One, coverage starts at 2.15pm. Alternatively, the game is also on BBC Two, where coverage starts at 3pm. You can also follow the action on our live blog on The Irish Times Sport website.
Paths to the final
Donegal become the first team to play 11 championship matches in one season, their single defeat coming to Tyrone in a group stage game.
Ulster Championship:
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- Donegal 1-25 Derry 1-25
- Monaghan 0-21 Donegal 0-23
- Donegal 1-19 Down 0-16
- Donegal 2-23 Armagh 0-28
All-Ireland Series:
- Donegal 0-20 Tyrone 2-17
- Cavan 1-13 Donegal 3-26
- Donegal 0-19 Mayo 1-15
- Donegal 2-22 Louth 0-12
- Donegal 1-26 Monaghan 1-20
- Donegal 3-26 Meath 0-15
Kerry, meanwhile, will be playing their ninth game in the final, also losing a group game, to Meath. Six of their eight victories have been by eight or more points.
Munster Championship:
- Cork 1-25 Kerry 3-21
- Kerry 4-20 Clare 0-21
All-Ireland Series:
- Kerry 3-18 Roscommon 0-17
- Cork 0-20 Kerry 1-28
- Meath 1-22 Kerry 0-16
- Kerry 3-20 Cavan 1-17
- Kerry 0-32 Armagh 1-21
- Kerry 1-20 Tyrone 0-17
What are the bookies saying?
Kerry are just about favourites with the bookies, 8-11 to evens, maybe favouring their experience in finals and/or the fact they have David Clifford.
Can Jim McGuinness and Michael Murphy pull another out of the bag?
Donegal have only been in three finals in their history and Jim McGuinness was heavily involved in them all. Playing in 1992, they beat Dublin in the final. Twenty years later, McGuinness led Donegal to the Sam Maguire again as manager, and again two years later in a final they lost to Kerry. A fourth All-Ireland final beckons and they look as strong as they’ve looked since McGuinness was last at the helm.
After losing in the semi-finals last year, legendary forward Michael Murphy came out of retirement after dabbling in punditry at GAAGo and with a column in this newspaper. Murphy, at almost 36 years old, has been a talismanic figure in bringing his county back to the final, as top scorer for Donegal and winning lots of aerial duels and physical battles.
But the star of McGuinness’s show is undoubtedly the collective, as well as their fitness and conditioning, where the tireless half backs and forwards like Ryan McHugh, Péadar Mogan and Ciarán Moore have had big seasons. Donegal defend in numbers and then counter up the pitch with intensity, and few have been able to live with them at full throttle, as Meath found in the semi-final.
Can Donegal stop David Clifford?
What constitutes stopping David Clifford for Donegal? The Kerry forward is one of the best to ever grace the game and in seemingly unstoppable form. A masterful performance by Mick Fitzsimons for Dublin limited Clifford to only two points from play in the 2023 final, but even stopping Clifford to four or five from play or keeping him out of the goals could be considered a great effort.
Clifford has scored four goals and 23 points in his last three games. If Donegal focus too many resources on stopping Clifford then his brother Paudie and Seán O’Shea can wreak havoc. The new rules focusing on attacking football have been a boost for Kerry, with the best forwards in Ireland, and it gives them the best chance of winning the Sam Maguire.
Team news
The teams will be updated here when they are made available.
Diarmuid O’Connor participated in the full Kerry training session on Saturday, increasing hopes that the midfielder will make his return from a shoulder injury. Paul Geaney also took part after a shoulder injury, with Tom O’Sullivan still not fully back after a calf injury.
Can I buy tickets?
All-Ireland final tickets do not go on public sale, they go straight to the clubs. So it may be a case of knowing the right person, the amount going to each club at the discretion of the county boards of the competing counties. Raffling tickets is a common way to win them, so maybe have your fingers crossed for your lucky number to be called out.
