SECOND CHANCE…Colm Bradleys highlights some key areas that could decide Saturday’s game
Colm Bradley argues that Cavan’s system while effective has three key components that Fermanagh need to counter on Saturday night
No two games are the same and usually when two sides meet again in quick succession the games can be very different. But they are normally different because the both sides inevitably learn something from the first meeting and it is usually the team who learns the most who go on to win. In this regard I think Fermanagh have much more to learn than Cavan.
In the first game the Cavan game plan worked brilliantly for all but twenty five minutes of the game, ten before half time and 15 after. For the other 45 odd minutes they were well on top and in truth should have been ten points to the good by half time. Yet they only won by two points. Fermanagh should take great heart from this.
So what do the Erne men have to do to reverse the result? Counteract three key components of the Cavan game plan.
1 – Strength in numbers
It is unfair and lazy to say that Cavan have all of a sudden decided to copy the Donegal system this year. Some teams have. Cavan is not one of them. These players have been honing this system for a few years. The first building block of their success is numbers in defence. Crucially however they do not seem to opt for any time of zonal marking. Instead they look to tackle and put pressure on the opposition.
They do this because they want to force turnovers. Forcing turnovers is easier when you have two and three men tackling the ball carrier. To this end Cavan players will try and ‘turn’ the ball carrier into other tacklers to either force the over-carry or force the turnover. And because they get numbers behind the ball they have been very effective at this.
For Fermanagh to succeed they have to pull the defence wide. Shane McCabe in particular will have to work the full width of the pitch. He is a player that Cavan will simply not allow to have easy ball so Shane has to bring his marker wide and out of his comfort zone. Meanwhile, inside in the full forward Tomas Corrigan and Sean Quigley have to do the same. Lot’s of crossing and lung bursting runs will be required because not only do they have to occupy their markers but they also have to distract the sweepers enough to want to track their run. The players out the field meanwhile have to get them quick ball, or use their runs as decoys to get runners through the middle.
In truth it will be a combination of quick ball and runners off the shoulders that will hurt this Cavan defence but in any scenario the ball must change direction. Lateral, slow, ponderous movement up the middle will result in defeat.
2 – Short kick outs and Break ball
Both teams the last day used a lot of short kickouts and I would imagine that both forward lines will be told to ensure that cheap possession is not given up in this manner on Saturday night. In an outnumbered forward line communication is vital to make sure Cavan options are split and the keeper has to kick long. And then break ball is vital. I used to think breaking ball was all about heart and determination and sometimes it can come down to just that. But when you have two times with equal heart and determination it comes down to who has the players more equipped to read the breaking ball.
Cavan dominated this stat against Monaghan, especially in the first half and they are a team who are very effective at picking up the dirty ball. Cian Mackey in particular is a master. If I were the Fermanagh team I would not look to anticipate the break ball. Instead I would mark the Cavan half forwards and half backs from every kickout. That means that the person who is Mackey’s marker, for example, has only one job at kickouts, to stop him getting the ball.
Doing this is sometimes a much better option than trying to outfox a player who is a much better exponent of picking up breaks than you are. You will even find that you start winning a few breaks yourself.
3 – Passing from a certain spot
One of the most frustrating things for an inside forward is not knowing when the players out the field are going to kick the ball. The better teams, who play long ball into their forwards, do not have that problem because thy work the ball to certain areas of the field and then look long for the pass and as a result the inside forwards know when the ball is coming. Donegal do it after they force a turnover. Dublin do it all the time while Mayo have been honing the long ball this year. The point to kick from is usually somewhere around seventy yards from goal and then a long pass is played into the full forward line.
Cavan don’t kick from that far out. They, like Kerry interestingly enough, like to work the ball much closer before delivering the ball to their inside line. The pass is usually in the form of a little popped kick pass into space, no more than 30 yards and at times can be a fistpass over 15 to 20.
This means that their shooters get the ball close to goal and Martin Dunne in particular benefits from this. He gets a ball which the defender can’t win and once he has ball in hand he is excellent at throwing one dummy and working into a shooting position.
Fermanagh need to try and make Cavan kick from further out, or at least slow their build up. Cavan will try and get runners at pace through the middle third before looking up and popping the pass. These runners have to be stopped.
Slowing them down and forcing them to recycle will lead to more turnovers or longer kick passes. Either way, this is a better scenario than allowing Cavan to pick out Dunne or Keating from the fifty yard line.