Tyrone - 1-14 S O'Neill 0-5, two frees; E Mulligan 1-0; Peter Canavan 0-2, free; B Dooher 0-2; Pascal Canavan 0-1; G Cavlan 0-1; D McCrossan 0-1; B McGuigan 0-1; C McAnallen 0-1

Armagh - 1-9 S McDonnell 1-2; O McConville 0-4, three frees; D Marsden 0-2; C O Rourke 0-1, free

REFEREE: J Bannon (Longford)

ATTENDANCE: 30,085

No matter which way you come to it Ulster is a long, hard road to travel. Yesterday at Clones, a traditional foothill, Tyrone brought the hunger and Armagh the experience. Regardless of what the cliche may insist, old dogs are not always best for this kind of expedition. Youth and hunger made the difference.

For the Ulster champions it was an afternoon when all their weaknesses were exposed cruelly. After their jousts with Kerry last year we suspected their defence was uncomfortable being run at. So it proved yesterday with the full-back line being pulled hither and thither. Then there was the shallowness of their panel. The championship is a 20-man game these days and as hungry young Tyrone substitutes swarmed the pitch Armagh only introduced two of their three used subs in the final five minutes.

The difference in desire was evident from the throw-in, from which Tyrone scored one of the quickest goals seen in a championship game. Cormac McAnallen broke the ball to Kevin Hughes, who soloed and launched a ball towards the square which dropped cruelly behind the defence. We had just noted Ger Reid had opted to mark young Owen Mulligan when the latter stuck a foot out and guided the ball into the corner of the net.

If Mulligan made the biggest impact early on it was Stephen O'Neill, a year older at 20, who took a lot of the responsibility thereafter. It was he who scored the next two points for Tyrone after Oisin McConville had pulled a score back in the second minute.

With Reid following the mobile Mulligan and Enda McNulty dogging Peter Canavan the spaces kept opening up near the Armagh goal. Canavan added a free and then Declan McCrossan soloed down the left wing and hit a heartbreaker of a point from out near the touchline. Ten minutes gone and Armagh sent the O'Rourke brothers from Dromintee down the line to warm up. That was about all they had going by way of ideas though.

Around the middle third of the field Tyrone were snapping up everything, pulling the high ones down from the sky, scraping the loose ones up off the grass.

Armagh's best move of the day and the one which might have brought them back into the game earlier came in the 18th minute. McConville snapped up possession out on the right wing and placed a lovely ball back across the endline and into the square, where Diarmuid Marsden arrived with sirens blazing. With the goal virtually at his mercy, though, the ball bounced off Marsden's chest and he managed to fist it over for a point. That spurred one of Armagh's better periods, however, and Tyrone didn't score for 24 minutes of the half. Marsden added another point, McConville had a free and there were just three points in it.

Nothing was flowing smoothly, however. Tyrone were fighting for everything, sometimes bad temperedly, and they found sufficient rhythm in the final minutes to benefit from points by Pascal Canavan and Ger Cavlan. Armagh tagged another couple on with unlikely fluency and they went to the break scuffling their way down the tunnel with a goal between them.

If Armagh laid plans for the second half they were unlikely to have been daring enough to include a goal after 15 seconds but sure enough, Barry O'Hagan fed Marsden, who switched to Stephen McDonnell, who fisted to the net.

Armagh were onto something and those moments of grace which are the right of champions came to them suddenly. McConville had a free before McDonnell fisted another point and the great banked hill in Clones was suddenly awash with orange flags. Isolating McDonnell in at full forward seemed to be working splendidly and Diarmuid Marsden was gaining influence.

The flesh was weak, however. Stephen O'Neill had a free for Tyrone and they were off again. Brian Dooher, who spent the entire second half waving at the sideline to tell them about the dead leg which had him limping extravagantly, scored the first of two fine points. Armagh scored just one point in the final half hour of play. They needed fresh legs and fresh ideas but could only watch as Tyrone kept coming up with plenty of both. Brian McGuigan arrived in with 16 minutes left and towards the end hit a honey of a point from the right. Moments like that kept happening to Armagh.

For Tyrone, who advance to play the winners of the Derry-Antrim clash, it was a sweet afternoon. Most encouraging was the fact that although they relied occasionally on Peter Canavan's experience and cuteness in directing the forwards and making the spaces, they slipped and weaved like a unit. Little wonder that having arrived as slight outsiders they went home as Ulster championship favourites.

"There's a way to go yet," said Art McRory, who spent the afternoon perched owl-like on a gate jotting in his clipboard. One suspects the distance Tyrone will have to travel has already been legislated for.