LAST YEAR in the Allianz League Division 1 Donegal had a host of hard luck stories; this year in Division 2 there was a narrow opening day win.
Donegal shaved the feathers off Kerry, Galway and Dublin in their first three fixtures of 2018 as Declan Bonner had taken over the reins from Rory Gallagher.
Ultimately, Donegal were only relegated in injury time of their last outing when Mayo’s Kevin McLoughlin levelled the scores in Ballybofey, so this afternoon’s 0-16 to 0-13 success over Clare in Ennis was a welcome on.
Leading 0-10 to 0-8 at the break, Donegal were poor in the third quarter and fell behind as Clare put the foot to the pedal. However, the visitors to Cusack Park steadied themselves and ran out three-point winners. Hugh McFadden’s penultimate point was perhaps the insurance point.
“Clare dominated the proceedings again at the start of the second half, and they were very close to getting a goal, and they kicked some fine scores,” McFadden said afterwards.
“We had a lot of possession in the middle part of the second half, but we didn’t kick enough scores during that period, and I think we had eight or nine wides and shots dropped short.
“I thought we controlled the game well at the end and we created a few scores, and thankfully we’re leaving here with two points.”
It wasn’t vintage Donegal by a long stretch. But for a relatively young group of players with McFadden their skipper today, there’s certainly no harm in coming out on the right end of the result.
“I suppose to summarise we wanted to win the game and we done that,” the Killybegs clubman added.
“We would be happy with the performance in spells during the game but unfortunately, there were spells when we were very mediocre.
“I thought from about the seventh minute to the 23rd minute, we played very good football and we dominated the game for large periods.
“We let Clare back into the game before half-time and played average football again.”
Donegal were well supported in Ennis – the first leg of their three trips to Munster this spring with Tipperary next month and then Cork in March. Clare, too, had plenty of encouragement and deserve credit for coming from three points down to lead and they were right in the mix till the bitter end.
“The Clare crowd were dying to get behind something,” McFadden added. “I know they went in front at the start of the second half, but once we got into a one point lead, we were able to stay ahead.
“Unfortunately that one point lead was very dangerous looking until we got it out to two, and then they went back and brought it to one again.
“It was dangerous and there was some last ditch defending there, blocks and half-clearances that just kept the distance between us. Clare played a lot of good football and we have a lot to learn before we play Meath next week.”
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