‘Patchy’ Dubs crush Royals with weight of their press

Dessie Farrell’s response to the opening bowl in his post-game media briefing, as to what he “made of it”, encapsulated everything about this Leinster quarter-final. “Next question,” he retorted.

Even the Dublin manager is losing the diplomacy to plámás and patronise a game like this.

Everything about it had an air of inevitability attached, the way it started, the way it played out, and the way it finished.

There was scarcely an ‘ooh’ or an ‘aah’ from a 21,445 attendance that might have tempted the seagulls to keep their distance until the coast was clear.

Dublin had been “patchy”, Farrell accepted, but even with that were able to summon enough fluency to register a 16-point win. Third gear at best.

For Meath, it was worse than the 13-point margin two years ago, but not as bad as the 21 points between them in the 2020 Leinster final.

It’s hard to see the progress there amid a continuing sense of running to stand still, but their manager Colm O’Rourke beat the same drum that he has beaten for much of 2023 and through this year’s league. They’ll be better for days like this and better all round by the year’s end.

“We haven’t closed the gap on Dublin at all,” he accepted. “But these players are ambitious and they are willing to work hard and as I keep saying, a lot of them are very young and lacking experience. I still think we will get a lot better over the next year.

“I think we will even be better by the time the Sam Maguire comes around. I just hope we are not drawn with Dublin!”

They held their own early on and were level, 0-3 each, when Ronan Jones kicked away possession at one end and Dublin ruthlessly swept downfield in numbers for Seán Bugler to ride two tackles, while taking steps that were in double figures, to score the first goal on 20 minutes.

From then on it was damage limitation, even if they got to half-time just five points adrift, 1-8 to 0-6.

Dublin had used the game to reintegrate some of their ‘old guard’, Stephen Cluxton and Mick Fitzsimons starting their first competitive game since the All-Ireland final and James McCarthy coming off the bench in the second half for his first action since the first game of the league against Monaghan. Paul Mannion started too and was Dublin’s most efficient forward, scoring 1-6.

“Obviously some of those lads have a lot of miles on the clock,” said Farrell. “Keeping them fresh, both physically and cognitively, is important. This thing is coming at you very quickly now from here on in. We sort of targeted the championship as a time to try and get them back in the mix.”

Meath also made a pre-game goalkeeping change, bringing Billy Hogan in for a championship debut instead of Seán Brennan who, O’Rourke suggested, was carrying a knee injury. But Meath’s kick-out was crushed after half-time, by our count losing nine of the 19 they had.

That pressure inevitably led to cracks that Mannion, Ciarán Kilkenny, Con O’Callaghan and later substitute Paddy Small ruthlessly exploited.

“They pushed up a line of four in the full-forward line and another line of four and took their chances that if it went over that line we wouldn’t do to them the sort of damage that Derry did to them,” O’Rourke said, referencing the recent league final.

“Of course, they completely hemmed us in and a long kick-out to Cian McBride was about all that we were left with. I wouldn’t fault Billy Hogan on that. It was just a systems failure all over the pitch.”

By the end, Meath lungs were burning as Dublin stepped it up. The gap was still in single figures crossing the 60-minute threshold, but it was precarious.

Then Small cut in along the end line, eventually shovelling the ball across the goalmouth into Mannion’s flight path and with one elegant stroke Mannion had sidefooted a second Dublin goal. An ugly finale threatened.

Mannion might have had an earlier goal but for Adam O’Neill’s goal-line clearance, while Cian Murphy, on one of his many forays forward, shot wide, but they did get a third goal in injury-time when Meath lost possession running out of defence, and with Hogan

stranded, O’Callaghan pounced.

The absence of the suspended Brian Fenton barely registered in a game like it.

Meath will pick some small shards of positivity out of it. But only small. Ciarán Caulfield did well at wing-back, Jack O’Connor brought badly-needed line-breaking after half-time and McBride, another substitute, got his hands to a few kick-outs. And there were a few inventive moves, James Conlon’s 48th-minute point about the best of it.

Cluxton even missed the target with five of 10 first-half kick-outs.

But Meath were so physically swamped that you’d wonder if the gap really can close.

Ross Ryan got a taste of that coming

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out of defence in the 55th minute when four Dublin players got around him and squeezed. He hadn’t a chance and John Small picked up a gift of a second point.

“The fellas who are with me, Stephen (Bray), Trevor (Giles), Barry Callaghan, we’ve all had days like that in Croke Park and the test is to just come back from it,” said O’Rourke.

“I said in the preview before the game that Dublin had players that had more All-Ireland medals than we had players who had played in the Leinster Championship.

“In my time playing football I’d say that James McCarthy and Brian Fenton and Ciarán Kilkenny and Con O’Callaghan are probably better players than I have ever seen here. We have to take that into account, yet it sets a bar for us to try and get to,” he said. But until they come up with a better and more patient defensive plan, these days against the leading teams will continue to roll around.