Dublin head into the Leinster SFC Final against Westmeath on Sunday chasing their sixth Leinster title in a row, that was last acheived by the famous Dubs team of the 70’s.
Dublin have reached this years decider without having to come out of second gear such is the paucity of the challenge in the rest of the province.
With such a poor challenge Dublin had some less than fluid periods in their games against Laois and Meath, with some media outlets eluding to the Dubs being sloppy during those games, but that’s not a word Jim Gavin would attach to his squad.
“I’d say probably a little inconsistent,” he said in an interview with the Herald.
“That inconsistency is there.
“I thought against Meath, particularly in the opening quarter, we created a lot of chances, they played with nearly 13 men behind the ball,” he recalled.
“But we still created scoring opportunities; we didn’t take them which was the disappointing thing. That’s what we’ve been working on, on the training park over the last while.
“So if we can tighten up that end of it, I think the performances will improve.”
With Dublin facing the same side they beat by thirteen points in last years Leinster Final and the fact that many of the players in the Dubs squad have multiple Leinster medals to their name, many have questioned how much this group of players value another title.
Gavin though was quite adamant that his squad are as hungry as ever for more Leinster silverware and they are as passionate now as they have ever been about the Leinster Championship.
“Maybe from the outside in, that would seem the case, but these boys are passionate about the Leinster Championship.”
“They want to retain the Delaney Cup. It’s something that they’ve spoken about. It means a lot to them.
“And I’m sure it means a lot to…people in Athlone, Moate, Mullingar – they’ll be travelling to Dublin to see their boys go home with the cup so it means as much to us as it does Westmeath.”
