IN an extensive look-back piece in next week’s Gaelic Life, GAA journalist Declan Bogue says that Jim McGuinness was fortunate to receive any sort of sympathy for axing Kevin Cassidy from the Donegal panel back in November 2011.

Bogue wrote a book ‘This Is Our Year’ in which Cassidy opened up about the inner workings of the Donegal team which reached the All-Ireland semi-final that year under their enigmatic manager Jim McGuinness.

While Cassidy painted a positive portrait of the McGuinness regime, he was dropped from the panel as a result of his involvement in the book.

Bogue believes that McGuinness knew himself that he was in the wrong, pointing to a later u-turn where he asked the Gaoth Dobhair player back into the camp.

Bogue explained: “I was a little annoyed when Kevin was cut from the panel that it was portrayed as this cut throat, ballsy move by McGuinness. ‘What a guy’ kind of stuff.

“Well if it was that ballsy why then go up to Kevin’s school at Easter and ask Kevin personally to rejoin the panel? The truth of the matter is, and Jim has never acknowledged this, he behaved childishly.

“It was a childish reaction. Silly. And that’s not to take away from all that he achieved. You have to recognise that he was a complete game changer as an inter county manager. He was an amazing manager.

“And he could convey his message so well, so articulately like no one we’d seen before or have seen since.”

What’s more, at the post-match press conference following Donegal’s win in the All-Ireland final in 2012, Jim McGuinness declined to answer questions until Bogue was removed. Bogue says he wasn’t affronted on a personal level.

“My first instinct was to carry on and let them get their work done without me. In my naivety, even after, I didn’t think there would be much more said on it.

“I picked up a few interviews outside the dressing rooms from the players and then carried back on up to my station in the press area.

“But all of a sudden other journalists were then asking me to make a comment. I’d no wild interest. What would I be saying? I didn’t appreciate how big it would be.

“The thing with sport, everything kind of moves on instantly. I kinda did too. Every now and then it’ll crop up. I’ve a friend that still introduces me as the lad that cost Kevin Cassidy an All-Ireland medal.

“On the Monday after, I sat down and wrote a column on it. But by the Tuesday I’d moved onto the right story, the one of Donegal and their achievement and how they’d changed football. I’d moved on myself.”