Durcan will pressure Donegal stoppers
IT IS not like the GAA to miss a promotional trick but they did this week when they held a launch for a positive ageing initiative, where Donegal’s 1992 AllIreland winning captain Anthony Molloy was one of the celebrities in attendance.
With hindsight, their message would have been better served if they had invited along a Donegal All-Ireland winner of a more recent vintage, given the news that Paul Durcan has returned to training with the county.
It is not that he is that old for a goalkeeper that jarred – at 34 he is three years Stephen Cluxton’s junior – but that he has been away from the game at the top level for so long
You have to go back to the 2016 All-Ireland club final with Ballyboden St Enda’s, which he had to fly home from Qatar to play in, for the last time he was exposed to elite action.
While the word is that his chances of getting competitive game-time is a long shot, Donegal manager Declan Bonner would not have invited Durcan – who is now based in Sligo – to train unless he feels he can squeeze something out of him.
And Bonner’s decision to have used both last year’s No1, Shaun Patton and the previous season’s first choice, Mark Anthony McGinley, in alternate games this spring suggests that he may see the position as a problem area.
That problem might just get bigger with Durcan’s return.
After all, if his top two goalkeepers already feel like they are on trial, how much more pressure will they feel now that there is a two-time AllStar right behind them?
And while competition can be good for a panel, when it comes to goalkeeping, certainty can be even better.