Donegal seek to keep home fires burning as stunning Ballybofey record holds key to survival chances

HOME advantage carries significant weight in most sports but is it really that important in Gaelic games?

So far this year the Allianz Football League Division 1 has had 24 matches, of which 13 have been won by the home team, 10 by the away team with one draw, courtesy of Galway and Dublin in Salthill’s Pearse Stadium last weekend.

That’s a 56.25pc rate of success for home teams, better than the 50pc rate recorded in the same division in 2017 but right in line with the 57.14pc over the period from 2012 to 2016 inclusive.

So the prospects of home advantage, based on the last seven years of Allianz Division 1 league results, is only slightly better than half, nothing like what it’s made out to be.

It follows through the other divisions, with Division 3 the notable exception. This year 15 of the 24 games have been won by the home teams, with three draws. Include those draws and that’s up to 68.75pc for a home team.

For some counties, home advantage has been an anomaly. After noticing just how poor their home form was in the preceding years, Mayo addressed the issue for the 2014 league and got a response, winning all three games against Kerry, Cork and Derry.

However, they’ve slipped back to their old ways, with just four wins and a draw from the 14 games they’ve played at MacHale Park in Castlebar since – which sees them once again fighting for survival this weekend, though their championship record is obviously better, with just that 2016 Connacht semi-final defeat to Galway to impair a very healthy record this decade.

Thus, a journey to Ballybofey, for the only top-flight match that has a real consequence to the league table as both sides seek to avoid relegation, is unlikely to discommode them too much.

Except that Ballybofey has been quite a fortress for Donegal for most of this decade and certainly since they became an Ulster power under Jim McGuinness in 2011.

Draw or win on Sunday and they’ll have taken to 20 games an unbeaten sequence that dates back almost eight years to an Ulster championship defeat to Down, after extra-time.

Ironically, when they beat Antrim to commence their 2011 run, Ballybofey had not been a happy hunting ground for Donegal in Ulster championship games, having lost that game to Down after losses to Antrim and Derry in the two previous years.

The prospect of another Ballybofey defeat “brought a lot of private pressures”, McGuinness would admit in his autobiography years later.

Since then they’ve played 12 league and seven championship games in MacCumhaill Park without being turned over.

On both occasions that Jim Gavin brought Dublin teams north-west to the venue for

DRAW OR WIN ON SUNDAY AND THEY’LL HAVE TAKEN TO 20 GAMES AN UNBEATEN SEQUENCE THAT DATES BACK ALMOST EIGHT YEARS TO AN ULSTER DEFEAT TO DOWN

league games, they came away with draws.

For last year’s league game Dublin were back-to-back AllIreland champions in the middle of an unbeaten sequence at all venues themselves that had reached 31 but Donegal dug deep and Michael Murphy kicked an equalising free as both records were preserved.

Mayo, Kerry and Tyrone have all lost on visits there; Tyrone’s experiences compounded by Ulster championship defeats in 2013 and 2015 and league defeats in 2015 and 2017.

It says something about their unwillingness to yield there that four of their 12 league games have ended in draws.

Despite being such a fortress for them over the last seven years, Donegal move their league games around the county each year, with Fr Tierney Park in Ballyshannon and O’Donnell Park in Letterkenny used on a rota basis to share the load. While Ballyshannon holds up, their record in Letterkenny is very poor. Since league football returned there, they’ve won just two from 10 games played, including this year’s reversal to Galway. Prior to last year’s defeat to Kerry in Letterkenny, a fine venue with a good surface, the then Donegal manager Rory Gallagher made no secret of his wish that all Donegal’s home games would be played in Ballybofey.

He set out the case, stating it was where they were more familiar with, where they trained more regularly and where they felt more in touch with their supporters.

Donegal need to win to remain a Division 1 team for a fifth successive year but it looks like the game will come too soon for Patrick McBrearty who has missed the last two games with a knee problem.

Donegal have been lauded for their open approach but they have, along with Kerry, conceded the most goals (9) in the top f light.

Manager Declan Bonner (left) has succeeded in enticing Leo McLoone and Anthony Thompson back but the expected progression of younger players, Niall O’Donnell and Stephen McBrearty apart, has not been as obvious.