McEniff has reason to be cheerful at long last

It was an eerily quiet championship Sunday, with the great GAA carnival shutting down, except for a couple of local occasions in the north of the country. Keith Duggan reports

As ever, the power base in Ulster has proven stubborn. Down, the brightest light in football a decade ago, have returned to another provincial final with a handsome 2-11 to 0-11 win over Fermanagh, whose people return to the Lakelands more in the dark than ever as to when their year will come.

And in Ballybofey, Brian McEniff, one of Gaelic football's great survivors, smiled for the first time in many months after watching his team settle a local affair against Sligo.

The 0-16 to 0-11 victory marked a turning point for the neighbouring counties. Sligo were a hollow force in comparison to last year and depart the championship without leaving any real imprint.

Gone was their cavalier sense of adventure. Donegal hit an all-time low a month ago but after a few sleepless nights, the colour is returning to their cheeks.

McEniff, ever the diplomat, stood amidst the puddles and boots and mud of a post-game dressing-room and considered the extension of his life as a manager.

"There is a notice in the Great Southern Hotel in Sligo," he said at one point during a long and humorous confessional. "And it reads, 'A wise man learns more from a fool than a fool ever learns from a wise man'.

"The day you think you know everything there is to know in the game, you may pack it in."

McEniff, though, must have wondered at his own wisdom when he came back to manage Donegal almost a decade after bowing out. From a distance, it looked like he was tampering with a shimmering legacy.

And yet. Big names are disappearing and his own county are still there. "Yeah, we are still in the hat. Funny thing. Ten years ago, I had a very mature side, all married men. These boys are a crowd of youngsters, a whole different generation. And I suppose when I came back, they were looking at me and thinking 'what is this old fogey doing here?'.

"And I was standing in a dressing-room looking at them wondering what I was doing there. It has taken us a while but we are beginning to come together."

With Adrian Sweeney demonstrating the lone-star form of last summer and young Stephen McDermott on fire at midfield, the game settled into an unexpectedly comfortable win for Donegal.

For Fermanagh, it also went how it always does. The long wait continues. Down are as unable to lose Ulster semi-finals as Fermanagh are to win them.

Paddy O'Rourke brought his young Down team to Clones and it was the old statesman, James McCartan, that shot the goal to bring them back to the big time.

That goal, on 56 minutes, settled what was a topsy-turvy afternoon for Down. They blew a reasonable first-half lead, lost their full back just after the half-time tea and had to weather a strong argument from Fermanagh for most of the game.

But the closing story was familiar, with Fermanagh falling away and returning home with a bag-load of regrets.

Twenty four hours earlier saw the reunion in Clones of the Meath old school.

Seán Boylan shook hands with his former selector, Monaghan boss Colm Coyle, and then inflicted upon him a half hour of pure torture.

The game was dead in the water by the break, with Meath, playing like a team possessed, amassing 2-8 to Monaghan's paltry two points.

The home team played for pride alone over the sombre closing half and that much they recovered.

And that will be their lone tool as they consider the lonely task of building for next season. Another Sunday and the names are falling from the list of contenders.