<\/p>\n
<\/a><\/p>\n
But speaking to Neil Loughran of The Irish News after the game<\/a>, Jim McGuinness highlighted the influence of Down captain \u00d3dhran Murdock as a key factor.<\/p>\n Them boys played really well today and Murdock was unplayable.<\/p>\n He is, in my opinion, in the top couple of players in the country. He is an absolute top, top, top level player.<\/p>\n \u00d3dhran Murdock, who plays his club football with Burren, was outstanding once again, contributing 0-3 from midfield while dominating around the middle third with his athleticism, ball-winning and driving runs.<\/p>\n It\u2019s a performance that will have come as no surprise to Jim McGuinness, who worked with Down as a coach in 2023 and would have seen Murdock up close.<\/p>\n And the Donegal boss made it clear that having a player of Murdock’s calibre, alongside sharpshooter Pat Havern, makes Down a serious threat, as Donegal found out.<\/p>\n When you have a player like that in your ranks and another guy that can kick the ball over the bar as soon as he gets a blink at it, you\u2019re going to be a dangerous team.<\/p>\n If they didn\u2019t know him before now, they\u2019ll certainly know him now.<\/p>\n After this display, it\u2019s hard to argue with Jim McGuinness and his assessment.<\/p>\n SEE ALSO: Gaelic Football Power Rankings Thrown Into Chaos After Provincial Drama<\/a>
\nSEE ALSO: Roscommon Boss Dismisses Theories On Absence Of St Brigid’s Stars In Mayo<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Jim McGuinness was quick to single out one Down player after his side\u2019s shock Ulster Championship exit, and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":420989,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[21753,42,43,40,38,41,39],"class_list":["post-420988","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-down","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/420988","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=420988"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/420988\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/420989"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=420988"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=420988"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=420988"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}