James Loughrey makes a case for the defence

It was a weekend of decidedly defensive football in the upper reaches of the Allianz Football League. On Saturday evening Dublin certainly weren't going to get caught on the hop by Donegal like they were

in last year’s All-Ireland semi-final.

Ballymun Kickhams' John Small won the Setanta television Man of the Match award for a vigilant evening's screening his full-back line and holding the middle in a solid victory for the league holders.

In Castlebar Tyrone employed a blanket defence which prompted Mayo's Keith Higgins to comment to the Western People: "Any time they have 14 or 15 men behind the ball it's going to be difficult".

Dublin manager Jim Gavin had commented after the previous week's defeat in Páirc Uí Rinn that he had never seen a Cork side play so defensively.

On Sunday both Cork manager Brian Cuthbert and defender James Loughrey took mild issue with the depiction after the county's impressively economical defeat of Monaghan. The latter was particularly interested in the argument however, having played his career up until two years ago for his native Antrim.

There he had plenty of experience of the defensive protocols of Ulster football.

Most defensive

“I would disagree with Jim,” he said. “It definitely wasn’t our most defensive performance last week. We were very, very disappointed last week. We’re a bit farther ahead than Dublin maybe and that was the only reason that we won – not defensive structures or anything like that.”

He makes the point that playing a defensively-oriented game isn’t merely a matter of turning up and putting 13 players behind the ball.

“Look at Donegal: it takes a year or longer to master a defensive structure. You can’t just suddenly do it, especially coming up here to play these teams. The northern teams are so used to it and Monaghan play defence as well so maybe we wouldn’t have been so exposed but that’s still definitely a work in progress for us . . . .

“Last year we tried a bit but like I say you can’t just suddenly decide you’re going to play defensively and play a sweeper. Everyone tries to play a sweeper but 95 per cent don’t know how to play it – especially against Monaghan; you’re drawing players on. You have to work on it. (Jim) McGuinness (former Donegal manager) was taking the boys up to Letterkenny for nine hours just to talk about how to play it. There really needs to be a lot of time spent on how you play it.”

Like Dublin, Cork played an out-and-out offensive game in last year’s league. Both counties had sobering setbacks in the championship, Cork getting hammered by Kerry in the Munster final after which they played with greater caution.

Although Cork now sit on top of Division One, Loughrey believes there isn’t the same emphasis on getting results in this season’s league.

“We’re conscious it’s all about performance. Maybe last year with new management and a whole set of new players we did have to win some matches . . . but now it’s 100 per cent about performance. If we can stay safe and win a couple of matches – as Donncha (O’Connor) said, if we win three games and stay up and learn how to play, then happy days.

“I know a lot of managers say you need to play two or three game plans but you do and . . it’s in these games that we learn how to play.”