Beautiful struggle but an awful game

GAA: There was a kind of beauty in this All-Ireland final. Honestly. It was just hard to find. Tyrone won a game that started tentatively and ended negatively, writes Tom Humphries at Croke Park.

. They won it ironically, not by unsheathing the twin blades that are the Owen Mulligan and Peter Canavan attack but by defending with every other player available.

We'll quibble. They'll not care. Maiden All-Ireland title winners have special rights.

They have immunity from our complaints about the style of the game. Next spring they'll dig out the cuttings and use them for motivational sustenance. Until then they are All-Ireland champions. All they ever wanted to be.

The game was awful, the beauty was in the struggle, in the terrible hunger of the teams, especially Tyrone. Running at Armagh is like running at brick walls. Tyrone did it all day until Armagh just got tired of hitting them.

We'd hoped for a little better of course. Indeed, the tireless promoters of Ulster football had promised better. We thought the stars might be right, Neptune's house might be in Jupiter and Joe Kernan and Mickey Harte would both be feeling lucky and both go for the jugular. Tyrone might jab with the speed they are capable of. Armagh might lumber a little looking for the big knock-out.

Armagh finished with 14 men, although in the context of all that was going on around him Diarmuid Marsden could feel unlucky to have been ordered to take a walk with 14 minutes left. Marsden had been expressing a difference of opinion with Conor Gormley when Philip Jordan (otherwise excellent by the way) sprinted in to interrupt. His sense on high alert, Marsden turned and decked before he could be decked. A befuddled umpire was consulted. A messy decision, but not pivotal.

It's hard to know if such a staccato game even had a pivotal moment. Armagh are well prepared for the contingency of being a man down, for every contingency indeed, and Marsden's contribution hitherto had been muted.

The key moments - symbolically if nothing else - involved Peter Canavan. The decision to start him. The decision to take him off at half-time. The decision to send him back in at the end. Tyrone got it right each time and in doing so showed an awareness of themselves which is rare in first-time winners.

Tyrone can play without Canavan. They played the semi-final without him largely, but on an occasion such as this he is their leader, their free-taker, their goader and their inspiration. Starting without him after the weeks of speculation would have been a kick in the gut to some younger players. Taking him off at half-time on the understanding that he would be back for the finale gave Tyrone something to hold on for.

Canavan's physical contribution was limited but his presence was what made Tyrone different. Neither he nor Owen Mulligan ever got to grips with the Armagh full-back line, although it emerged afterwards that Canavan had suffered a relapse of his ankle injury last Friday while at training and, together with manager Mickey Harte, had decided to start regardless. In Tyrone to do anything less than start Canavan would be to diminish his life's work.

It was a fretful game which never opened up and enjoyed itself.

"We just never got going out there," said Joe Kernan afterwards. "I don't know why, it was just a game that it was hard to get a flow to."

Chances were hard to come by, but both sides could point to a few howling misses. Tyrone, in particular, might have had three goals were it not for some inventive wide kicking from Seán Cavanagh, Ger Cavlan and Owen Mulligan. Armagh's best chance fell to Steven McDonnell who compiled a wide in the first half and was heroically blocked by Conor Gormley late in the game.

Midfield often looked like men trying to stop buffalo stampeding down a narrow corridor, but Kevin Hughes of Tyrone stood out there, making the case for old-fashioned play on an afternoon when hardly one of Armagh's long diagonal passes went in early enough or found the hands they were intended for.

Armagh in the end discovered to their cost that they are predicable. Good, but predictable. They stood their ground like they have always done. They hit long balls. Occasionally they threatened to get right in behind the Tyrone defence and open the game with a goal. That promise was never consummated.

A fitting end to a strange season. Tyrone had a right at the start of things back in May to consider themselves among the favourites. The road they took is the surprise. More cautious and less derring-do than typical champions. They have the potential to shed their defensive skin and become one of the great attacking teams of our time.

What's for certain is that the rest of the footballing world is in chaos and a team growing in certainty and skill could dominate.

In Munster, Kerry are wounded and Cork are some way off the pace. In Leinster, the teams are all in various states of progress. Connacht this year was notable for the decline of Galway. For the North things are different, always have been.

For Tyrone, there will never be another time like this. Every village (well nearly) will get a glimpse of the team with the Sam attached. Clubs will prosper and children will be happy. Men in Tyrone tracksuits will be clapped onto many pitches over the winter months. They'll holiday well and eat plenty.

And as for next summer's Ulster championship? They have Armagh softened up already.