WE appear to be in the early stage of an outbreak of football, except in Down. Would it be too much to ask for some joy?

Conor McCarthy scored a quite brilliant hat-trick of goals for Monaghan against Donegal on Saturday, was awarded Man of the Match, then appeared before the cameras looking as though he had just been told he had 48 hours to live.

Q. You must be delighted after such a stunning individual performance?

A. It’s all about what happens on the day.

Q. And a terrific game of football?

A. It’s all about getting over the line.

Q. Talk us through your first goal.

A. It’s all about the team performance.

Q. The second?

A. It’s all about taking your opportunities.

Q. The third?

A. It’s all about killing the game off.

Q. Any chance of a smile Conor?

A. It’s all about getting ready for the next game.

Q. Is there an “I” in team?

A. That’s something we will have to reflect on as a group.

The industrialisation of Gaelic football has made everyone sound the same. Commentators, analysts, managers and players all sound like the Minister for Health at a press conference, receiving texts from his spin team.

Getting the Man of the Match award provokes the sort of reaction one might expect if one was outed as a paedophile. After the second game, it was Darren McCurry’s turn to walk the plank.

Q. Darren you must be delighted with your performance?

A. It’s all about what happens on the day.

Q. And a terrific game of football?

A. It’s all about getting over the line.

Q. Talk us through your first point from play.

A. It’s all about the team performance.

Q. What have Feargal Logan and Brian Dooher brought to the table?

A. That’s something we reflect on as a group

When May McFetridge saw a glum looking person in the audience, she would say “are you having fun?” When they said “yes”, she said “Well get your brain to send your face a message.”

Darren was very good. But Darragh Canavan was better. However, he never got the ball in a scoring position and so had to settle for giving a masterclass in tackling back and quarterback play that must have made God the Father proud.

As I said on telly, you could put a balaclava on him and you would still know he was Peter’s son. Paul Donaghy will take a while to get to the pace at this level, but it didn’t help that like his two scoring machine team-mates, he was left to operate on scraps. There are too many spoofers in that Tyrone team who cannot and will not move the ball early. Running about and getting a load of touches is no substitute for playing football.

As we saw on Sunday, when the two best teams in the country played the game the way it should be. Not a place for spoofers. We witnessed the sporting miracles that are David Clifford and Con O’Callaghan. Con has already established himself as one of the greatest ever players. At this point in time, I rate him the best footballer in the game.

Clifford however is in hot pursuit. He scored 4-4 in the All-Ireland Minor final in 2017. At times, Derry triple marked him but it made no difference. Earlier that season, he scored 2-5 in the Hogan Cup final, dazzling the favourites St Pat’s, Maghera. He has already amassed 10-123 for the Kerry seniors and records are being re-written as he goes.

The Dublin lads in our Trinity Old Boys Whatsapp group scoffed uneasily last weekend. “Clifford’s lethal in the league.” “If Kerry amalgamate with Cork they might give us a run.” Pat Gilroy’s running joke is that Corkerry (as he calls the amalgamation) would have “a serious chance of beating us in the league.” After Sunday, he suggested that it “was a great draw for Kerry and if Tipp join the Cork and Kerry amalgamation to form Tiporkerry they could run Dublin to five points in the championship.”

The Dublin players don’t scoff. Jonny Cooper was so terrified of him in the drawn 2019 final he got himself sent off in the first half for persistent fouling. Clifford made mince of Michael Fitzsimmons in the replay. Fitzsimmons is the best corner-back in the game but what can you do against this footballing war machine? On Sunday past, Clifford scored at will, posting 0-5 from play and icing the penalty to draw the game at the death.

The game will have brought Kerry on a lot. They have learned that you cannot drop back into a zonal defensive system and leave Clifford and co isolated. This is self-harm and is precisely what Peter Keane decided to do against Cork last year in Munster.

It was a humiliating lesson for Keane, whose public comments make the Healy Raes sound like realists. After the match against Galway, he said “That result could have gone either way just as handily.” To be fair, Kerry only won by the 22 points. So, if Galway had only scored another 23 points, they would have beaten them.

On the evidence of last weekend, the lesson is being learned throughout the country (except in Down).

The high press is crucial. It creates the right frame of mind for playing football. It also puts the opposing team on red alert. It forces them to make decisions quickly. The backs no longer have the luxury of soloing out at their leisure or taking a hand-pass or short kick-out under no pressure.

Now, they are looking over their shoulders. They are forced to make decisions while they are being hunted down by one or two forwards. The full-forward line becomes the first line of defence. The full-back line pushes up and becomes the last line of attack. The Tyrone and Armagh goals came from this.

We see this with the Dubs, where the aim is to turn every loose hand-pass, every dispossession, every misplaced kick into a goal or point. Now that they have perfected this, the Dubs are able to keep the score board ticking over. Every few minutes, a point is scored. One mistake – a goal. Suddenly they are five up. In no time, the game is gone. Tick, tick, tick, tick.

Teams are learning that solo running and hand-passing does the defence’s job for them. It is a fundamental truth that no team can drop back and defend their way to either victory or entertainment. That you cannot pick defenders in your forward line. Teams are learning to press high throughout, keep solo running to a minimum, kick the ball quickly and accurately, pounce on every error and punish the opposition.

With this template, skilled forwards thrive and the team is motivated and energetic. A dull game plan produces dull football. And it allows really good forwards to be severely restricted.

Dublin have been perfecting this for years. They tweaked it after the Jimmy McGuinness blip in 2014, leaving it future proof. Jimmy wrote a column in 2018 where he said that the only way to beat the current Dublin team is to “adopt five simultaneous game-plans.” One hopes Dundalk FC will not be as bewildered as readers of that column. And that they will hold onto Jimmy for a very, very long time.

23 May 2021; David Clifford of Kerry kicks a point despite the best efforts of Eoin Murchan of Dublin during the Allianz Football League Division 1 South Round 2 match between Dublin and Kerry at Semple Stadium in Thurles, Tipperary. Photo by Stephen McCarthySportsfile