Our basics let us down: Jim Gavin

Dublin manager Jim Gavin highlighted several areas for improvement for his side as they begin preparations for their NFL Division 1 Final against Cork in Croke Park on Sunday, April 26 (4.0).

“Our core skills which we apply ourselves to in our practice sessions; our hand-passing, our tackling were a bit sloppy,” said Jim in the wake of Sunday’s narrow victory over Monaghan.

“They're the basics of our game and they let us down. Once that didn't go right for us, we turned the ball over a lot and gave Monaghan a chance to penetrate against us.

“We're trying to give players more game-time and build towards that end. Certainly when you look at our first couple of games in the league we have tried a lot of players, and tried to give them game time.

“We tried a few new things, some have worked, some haven't and that's part of the growth side that any team wants.

“We understand that if we remain static, if we don't grow, teams will pass us. There's a challenge in that itself. Some of our performances haven't been up to what we'd like, as in today's performance wasn't what it should have been.

“Somehow we got the result and I won't say we're happy for it, but we're glad for an extra game.”