Diver hails best performance

Donegal captain Michael Murphy celebrates at the final whistle

DAMIAN Diver is straight to the point. “I thought you were ringing me with a ticket, have you not got one? If you’ve got a ticket I’ll give you an interview!”

Since 5pm last Sunday tickets have became the over-riding thought of everyone in this football mad county. And when they aren’t desperately trying to tap up potential ticket sources, Donegal people are reliving their victory over Cork in the All-Ireland semi-final.

“It was a fantastic performance, as good a performance as I’ve seen in Croke park,” said Diver. “For a team to transfer out and out defence into out and out attack the way they do is amazing. They can do it at pace, you nearly couldn’t kick the ball up the field as fast as they are breaking out.

“The first 20 I was worried to a certain extent because every score Cork got they got it easy. They were looping around and looping around and then penetrating and tapping over the bar.

“However if you look at the last ten minutes of the first half they stopped that penetrating running. Whether the legs ran out I don’t know, but they ended up passing over and back in front of our half back line. Nobody was taking the responsibility of driving forward.”

The full story is in the current issue of Gaelic Life, published on Thursday August 30. Buy your copy now in your local newsagent, or you can purchase the online version – for only 90p – by clicking here