{"id":477346,"date":"2026-06-01T11:20:11","date_gmt":"2026-06-01T11:20:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/477346\/"},"modified":"2026-06-01T11:20:11","modified_gmt":"2026-06-01T11:20:11","slug":"dublins-silence-sounded-like-thunder-after-latest-defeat-what-we-learned-from-the-gaa-weekend-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/477346\/","title":{"rendered":"Dublin\u2019s silence sounded like thunder after latest defeat: What we learned from the GAA weekend \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

Dublin\u2019s silence sounded more like thunder<\/p>\n

When there\u2019s no trophy presentation in Croke Park it can sometimes make for a mad dash from the seventh-floor press box in the Hogan Stand down to the press conference room on the ground floor. Especially in time to hear what the winning manager has to say.<\/p>\n

They\u2019re invariably first in to share their thoughts, and Sunday\u2019s All-Ireland series first round tie between Louth and Dublin was no exception \u2013 Gavin Devlin bounding in not long after Louth\u2019s memorable victory, coming from six points behind at half-time, to secure their first championship win over Dublin in 53 years.<\/p>\n

Just four weeks after enduring a double-score defeat to the Leinster semi-final \u2013 0-20 to 0-10 \u2013 Devlin repeatedly referenced Louth\u2019s want and need to learn from that experience. He spoke about the hurt and the angst, the desire to be the best version of themselves, and ultimately not surrendering so easily to Dublin this time.<\/p>\n

After Devlin left the room, we were politely informed no one from the Dublin management team were making themselves available for comment. With manager Ger Brennan still serving his 12-week sideline suspension, there was some speculation this might have something to do with Donegal manager Jim McGuinness receiving no punishment for an apparently similar offence in Killarney the previous weekend.<\/p>\n

Speculative or not, with back-to-back championship defeats in Croke Park for the first time, after losing the Leinster final to Westmeath, (and remember Wicklow should have beaten them the first day out), maybe Dublin are simply struggling to find any answers right now. All of which made their silence sound more like thunder. \u2014 Ian O\u2019Riordan<\/p>\n

Aidan O\u2019Shea hits 100 mark for championship appearances\"AidanAidan O’Shea of Mayo against Monaghan, where he made his 100th appearance off the bench. Photograph: James Crombie\/Inpho <\/p>\n

There can only be one first time and while others might eventually get there, Aidan O\u2019Shea on Sunday became the first outfield player to reach 100 senior championship appearances. A certified championship centurion.<\/p>\n

O\u2019Shea made his championship debut against New York in a Connacht quarter-final at Gaelic Park in 2009 and in Clones on Sunday he came off the bench in the second half to make his 100th appearance in Mayo\u2019s All-Ireland SFC win over Monaghan.<\/p>\n

\u201cYeah, it\u2019s amazing,\u201d smiled Mayo manager Andy Moran afterwards. \u201cAidan gets no grief from us, only respect in our dressingroom \u2013 he comes to training, never misses a session, never gives out, just comes in and trains and away he goes. Some people can have their opinions on him, that\u2019s fine, but for us in Mayo 100 caps from an outfield player is huge.\u201d<\/p>\n

And during that time, O\u2019Shea has only missed one championship fixture \u2013 a 2012 Connacht semi-final against Leitrim. He is currently on a run of 89 consecutive championship matches.<\/p>\n

Former Dublin goalkeeper Stephen Cluxton remains the outright record holder with 128 championship appearances, while next in line behind O\u2019Shea is Donegal\u2019s Michael Murphy with 90 appearances, then comes former Tyrone player Se\u00e1n Cavanagh on 89, ex-Kerry defenders Tom\u00e1s and Marc \u00d3 S\u00e9 both on 88 and current Mayo boss Moran on 84. \u2014 Gordon Manning<\/p>\n

Clare\u2019s under-20 triumph proves they are working towards future\"Clare'sClare’s Eoghan Gunning celebrates with team-mates after winning Under-20 All-Ireland. Photograph: Stephen Heaney\/Inpho <\/p>\n

In Thurles on Sunday Clare added another chapter to their extraordinary record in the under 20\/21 championship. Their fifth All-Ireland title in the grade means that they have now won the ultimate prize each time they have won the Munster title.<\/p>\n

Their record in the Munster championship, though, was horrific until recently. In the first 45 years of the competition Clare contested 13 Munster finals, including three-in-a-row in the mid-90s, and lost them all. Their Munster final defeat to a crack Waterford team in the 1992 final famously cost Ger Loughnane his job as Clare under-21 manager.<\/p>\n

Clare have reaped a bumper harvest from those winning teams. The 2009 under-21 All-Ireland winning squad produced half a dozen players who won senior medals four years later. By then Clare had embarked on a sequence of three All-Ireland winning under-21 teams in a row and 12 players from that generation eventually played in the senior championship.<\/p>\n

One of the big themes of this year\u2019s under-20 hurling championship was the number of counties who had under-20 players on or near their senior teams, and the load management that involved. Jason Rabbitte and Aaron Niland in Galway, Ois\u00edn O\u2019Donoghue and Stefan Tobin in Tipperary, Barry Walsh in Cork, Se\u00e1n Mackey in Waterford and others had a foot in both camps which, given the condensed schedule, meant they couldn\u2019t start every game for both teams.<\/p>\n

A key difference with Clare was that only Ronan Kilroy from the under-20s panel made an appearance for the seniors in the championship, but his clear priority was the under-20 team. The Clare senior squad needs a transfusion of young blood and the current crop of under-20s will deliver that in the years to come, but Clare were patient with them this year and it paid a handsome dividend. \u2014 Denis Walsh<\/p>\n

Competition for places is fuelling Armagh\"Armagh'sArmagh’s Peter McGrane and Shea Downey of Derry. Photograph: Nick Elliott\/Inpho <\/p>\n

Of all the factors driving Armagh\u2019s increasingly impressive season, competition within the squad looks to be at a ferocious high. A couple of weeks back, Kieran McGeeney was asked how he kept his two goalkeepers happy, given that neither of them had the number one jersey nailed down. \u201cI keep them very unhappy, that\u2019s mainly my job,\u201d the Armagh manager said.<\/p>\n

That goes for them all. When Armagh won their All-Ireland in 2024, Barry McCambridge won an All Star and made the shortlist for Footballer of the Year. Now he can\u2019t get back into the team, having fully recovered from an injury picked up over the winter. He didn\u2019t get a run out against Derry at all on Saturday, in a game where McGeeney only used three of his substitutes.<\/p>\n

This has become far more a feature than a bug for the Armagh manager. During the league, Armagh used comfortably the fewest players of all the Division One counties. Whereas all seven of the other top-tier counties gave gametime to at least 32 players, only 24 got run-outs for Armagh. He only used two subs against Donegal and Mayo, and only three against Monaghan and Galway. At the time, they were struggling with injuries but they\u2019re close to full strength now.<\/p>\n

So much is made of Armagh\u2019s artillery off the bench and it\u2019s clearly a major weapon for them. On Saturday night, at a time when they were generally in control of the game against Derry anyway, they were able to send in Ross McQuillan, Oisin O\u2019Neill and Rory Grugan to close out the game. But the likes of McCambridge, Rafferty, Aidan Forker and Callum O\u2019Neill among others stayed sitting, stewing in their reduced minutes.<\/p>\n

When it comes down to it, that might turn out to be McGeeney\u2019s greatest weapon of all. \u2014 Malachy Clerkin<\/p>\n

Cavan show promise for the future with talent developing\"Cavan’sCavan\u2019s Conor Casey celebrates against Westmeath. Photograph: James Crombie\/Inpho <\/p>\n

Saturday night was, on the face of it, another bad one for Cavan. As many teams are finding out this summer, there\u2019s no shame in getting beaten by this Westmeath team. but if you go six points up in extra-time, even with the wind to come against you and the new rules making scoring a more fluid thing, you still have to see it out. They lost the second period of extra-time by 1-7 to 0-0. Not good.<\/p>\n

But it wasn\u2019t all a bust. For the first time since the middle of the 2010s when they had a slew of good under-21 teams filtering through, Cavan look to have finally unearthed a handful of new, exciting talent. Emmanuel Shehu has been for them, mixing his obvious physicality and hard running with some lovely kicking and point-taking. Darragh Lovett\u2019s pace is blinding and hints at an ability to do serious damage if he can add more assured finishing.<\/p>\n

But it was debutant Conor Casey who really took the eye on Saturday evening. Entering the fray in the 48th minute, Casey proceeded to take to inter-county football like it was his birthright. He is a big boy and doesn\u2019t care who knows it. He wired into a few tackles, plucked a few catches from the clouds and when landed a two booming two-pointers. The last one came in from the sideline with time running dead, an absolutely incredible score.<\/p>\n

Cavan\u2019s USP for years has been their experience and the battle-hardened nature of their squad. But eventually, that tips over into a team that has got old together. It\u2019s a long time since they\u2019ve had the sort of jolt of electricity that the likes of Shehu, Lovett and Casey brought on Saturday.<\/p>\n

Yes, they lost to Westmeath. And plenty of the other teams will want them in Tuesday\u2019s draw. But there\u2019s the promise of a future there, suddenly. In time, it might feel like an important night\u2019s work. \u2014 Malachy Clerkin<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Dublin\u2019s silence sounded more like thunder When there\u2019s no trophy presentation in Croke Park it can sometimes make…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":477347,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[36675,110979,4183,92418,61,167352,60,112],"class_list":["post-477346","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-five-things-we-learned","tag-football-championship","tag-gaa","tag-hurling-championship","tag-ie","tag-inside-gaelic-games","tag-ireland","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/477346","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=477346"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/477346\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/477347"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=477346"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=477346"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=477346"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}