Allianz Football League Division Two, round one
Cavan 0-20 Monaghan 2-22
EIGHT years ago in Castleblayney, Cavan and Monaghan slugged out a 0-7 to 0-7 draw on the League’s opening day that went so far past forgettable that it came back around to being memorable.
In Breffni on Saturday evening, Monaghan won the derby’s latest instalment by 2-22 to 0-20.
The combined total of 48 points is the highest aggregate score the two counties have ever put up in a 70-minute game across 137 years of playing them.
Even if you remove the nine extra points from the avalanche of two-pointers kicked, it’s still the highest aggregate since 1932.
That’s a very bare naked way to look at things but that is how the game felt. Stripped of its old tracksuit set and forced to wear something bright and spangly, whether it likes it or not.
For a while, the focus will be on the rules. Do you like the two-pointers or not? Did you see the time the referee gave a 20-metre free instead of one on the halfway line because somebody infringed the three-up rule? And what about Rory Beggan running the show (more on that later)?
But what of the game itself?
For a freezing cold night in the hangover of a storm that took out almost every source of light between Clones and Cavan town, there was a notable up-and-downness to it.
There were slow periods that allowed both goalkeepers to join the attack but they were less domineering over the spectacle as a whole.
Beggan’s first venture upfield after three minutes created the 12v11 and Monaghan won a penalty that Conor McCarthy tucked neatly into the corner.
Each of the first six times the Scotstown goalkeeper created the overlap, Monaghan scored. And then on the seventh occasion, he was meandering out, a team-mate gave the ball away and it was a scurry back that he ought not to have gotten away with. Ciaran Brady carried into the tackle rather popping it off and the chance went away.
Gabriel Bannigan smiled that the rules have “changed for everyone else but they haven’t changed for Rory, he’s been playing that way for years.”
Raymond Galligan, former roving netminder, felt it was the fly in the game’s good new ointment.
“It was good, I thought as a neutral it was probably exciting to see. We leave here again talking about a goalkeeper rather than anything else,” said the Cavan boss.
“Rory Beggan, exceptional goalkeeper, but I don’t think that’s what the rules are there for.
“The 12v11 I think is going to cause more questions rather than answers. I understand the rationale behind it but that probably doesn’t add to the spectacle.
“You’d like the teams to have similar balance in defence and attack and then it creates better one-on-one duels. We had the same advantage at times but I don’t think that’s what the goal was when they were sitting down to make these new rules.
“There’s much more well accomplished managers and a committee in place to make these decisions, I’m certainly not one to make any suggestions.
“I just felt today as a spectacle it probably took the sting out of the game by being able to have that extra body, no different than we had in the first half.
“It probably just lacks those one-on-one duels we were all excited to see more often than not because the defence has to defend with one less body.
“It’s just one area, I thought there were huge positives, the solo and go, the two-pointers, pressing the kick-outs. I’d be in favour of the majority of it.”
It was a prevailing theme but not the only one, even when it comes to Beggan himself.
His laser right boot was redundant from kick-outs. He got the first one away to the sideline and every other kick-out for the rest of the night bar one, he had no choice but to throw it up into the sky.
Cavan dominated a lot of that stuff too, with Killian Clarke doing well in the air and Dara McVeety patrolling the ground, particularly in the second half.
They had a six-minute spell where they cut a nine-point lead to five and as Bannigan admitted afterwards, there was a sense that the game was never quite done.
“Normally if you had an eight-point lead you’d be running the bench but the game never felt like it was over,” said the new Monaghan chief.
The players themselves notice the difference too.
The distance they’re covering isn’t maybe altered all that hugely but it’s the volume of high-speed running compared to the olden days of 2024.
Conor McCarthy was one of a number of Monaghan players like David Garland, Stephen Mooney, Micheal Bannigan, whose pace and size looked very quickly aligned with what might be successful in the new game.
The pace of the game was, to him, very noticeably different.
“Listening to Jim Gavin on a podcast the other day, he was very clear on why they’ve done this and brought a lot of these rules in. I have full faith in that team to look at these games over the next couple of weekends and see what tweaks they can make to it.
“From a player’s point of view, just the demands on players, the high-speed running and the kilometres covered, I just hope the players can keep healthy and there aren’t injuries around the country. But those men have good minds there.
“We’ll get the results from tonight but it feels like there are fewer stoppages and it’s more free-flowing, which is what they wanted to bring in. You’re never really standing doing nothing, you always have some sort of job to do. You’re always getting back or getting forward, there’s always something to be at. There’s a lot more high-speed stuff.”
As for the details of the game, McCarthy got the first goal, David Garland bundled in the second.
Cavan kicked four two-pointers with the wind in the first half, with Dara McVeety trying his hand from a few big distances, but Monaghan overtook that and ended up with five from outside the new arc.
It was as imperfect and sometimes messy as you might expect when everyone is getting used to it.
But by God it was a far cry from 0-7 apiece in Castleblayney.
MATCH STATS
Cavan: G O’Rourke (0-1); N Carolan, B O’Connell, J McLoughlin; P Faulkner (0-1), D McVeety (0-4, 1tp), O Kiernan (Castlerahan, 0-2, 1tp), K Clarke (0-2, 1tp), E Crowe; Ciarán Brady, G Smith, L Molloy (0-1f); R O’Neill, J Smith (0-1), S McEvoy (0-5, 1tpf, 1f)
Subs: R Donohoe for E Crowe (HT), TE Donohoe (0-1f) for R O’Neill (HT), Conor Madden (0-2) for G Smith (47), T Madden for L Molloy (54), Cian Reilly for P Faulkner (70)
Monaghan: R Beggan (0-6, 1tp, 2tpf); R Wylie, K Lavelle, D Byrne; R O’Toole, G McPhillips, C McCarthy (1-04, 1-0 pen, 2ptf); B McBennett (0-2), M McCarville; R McAnespie (0-1), M Bannigan (0-4, 2f), C McNulty; D Garland (1-4, 1tp, 1f), M Hamill (0-1), S Mooney
Subs: J Doogan for M Hamill (temp, 10, reversed 15), B McCaul for M Hamill (temp, 21, reversed 28), S Jones for S Mooney (43), B McCaul for C McNulty (54), J McCarron (0-1f) for B McBennett (60), J Irwin for G McPhillips (69), C Lennon for R O’Toole (70)
Referee: L Devenney (Mayo)