Tyrone prove unstoppable

Whatever lessons Dublin may have learnt in Croke Park a week ago, they clearly failed to remember them in Breffni Park on Saturday afternoon. In fact, so drastic was the drop in form that it was hard to fathom how they had ever conjured a replay in the first place.

In contrast, Tyrone took their performance of a week ago and sharpened it into a lethal weapon. Dominant in all areas practically from the start, they won pulling away, and thus followed up on the county's win in 1998 for its fifth title in all.

Dublin supporters had travelled in confident mood. Long before the final whistle though, they were on their way out again.

Two goals within 10 minutes of the start of the second half had helped push Tyrone into a 12-point lead, a margin they would more or less sustain without any threat until the end. Determined beyond fault, it was the sort of display that simply crushed the opposition, forcing Dublin to go the entire game without a score from play.

"We just had a lot of under-par performances," explained Dublin manager Paddy Canning. "Tyrone were stronger and their running was excellent, and some of their score-taking was out of the top drawer.

"We have no excuses, just well beaten by a much better team on the day. We were living off scraps and they punished us. So there's not much more I can say about it except that we're very disappointed, but take nothing away from Tyrone. They were superb and deserved their victory."

Playing with the aid of a useful breeze, Tyrone soon settled into the game. Although Declan O'Mahony briefly put Dublin in front from a free, the scoring limitations of the Leinster champions would soon become apparent. Wides or wasted ball were the order of the day.

Once Leo Meenan equalised after eight minutes, Dublin were already struggling. Gerard Toner was stopped in his last stride from a certain goal, and with Peter Donnelly and Sean Cavanagh again lording midfield, the Tyrone attacks seemed endless.

Fortunately from a Dublin point of view, Tyrone's lead was just 0-6 to 0-2 at the break: "Four points wasn't insurmountable," agreed Canning, "but we weren't playing well. We missed a number of chances, but we still thought the second half would be close and that we'd have a 50-50 chance if we improved. Unfortunately the team that improved in the second half was Tyrone".

Meenan inflicted the first piece of fatal damage just two minutes after the restart by taking a long ball from Barry Mulligan, comfortably fending off the Dublin corner-back, and shooting the ball into the net. Martin Penrose followed that with a second goal that even he believed was headed for a point, only for the ball to drop early and deceivingly into the Dublin net. That left it 2-9 to 0-3.

Dublin failed to raise any sort of response, losing out on every breaking ball and paying the price for every inch of their hesitation. And with five of their players booked, it wasn't too surprising when Graham Cullen was sent off minutes before the end for his second yellow card.

Overall then the prefect day for Tyrone: "We wanted to finish off the job alright," explained Cavanagh, who contributed two memorable points from play. "Maybe we got the bit of luck this time with the goals. But I'd put it all down to determination and grit."

TYRONE: J Devine; R O'Neill, D Carlin, M McStravog; J McMahon, K McCrory, P Quinn; P Donnelly (0-1, a free), S Cavanagh (0-2); C Donnelly, B Mulligan, T McGuigan; L Meenan (1-4, two frees), M Penrose (1-1), G Toner (0-3, two frees). Subs: N Gormley for Meenan (61 mins).

DUBLIN: P Copeland; D Galvin, M Fitzpatrick, D McCann; P Griffin, B Cullen, B Lyons; P Brennan, D O'Mahony (0-2, both frees); N McAuliffe, G Cullen, G Brennan; D O'Callaghan, D Farrell, J Noonan (0-4, three frees, one sideline). Subs: M Whelan for G Brennan (36 mins), N Clarke for Galvin (39 mins), M Taylor for P Brennan (51 mins).

Referee: D Joyce (Galway).