For Donegal manager Mickey Moran the emphasis was on serenity. Obviously chuffed to have visited a Meath dressing-room in order to extend his commiserations, he paused to replay his team's gripping but deserved win after a tense second half.

"They counteracted our third midfield ploy and played three on three. We had to drop back and lost ground as they came forward, forward, forward. I have to praise the lads for the last five or six minutes because they dug in and made good use of limited possession to get the scores that mattered. That goal could have gone the other way, but it went for us today.

"We approached this with a motto of no fuss. We'd no big speeches, no big things planned, very quiet the whole weekend. We went out very calm, but very controlled. I thought we stayed with them and played enterprising football in the first half and at the end of the day that calmness got us through.

"We are not world beaters. We have a lot of work to do, but please give us a wee bit of credit for winning this one."

Prodded on the subject of Michael Collins's uneven refereeing, the Donegal manager maintained the mellow keynote of his weekend.

"The referee's performance is assessed by the authorities so I'll leave it in their hands."

"We approached this with a motto of no fuss. We'd no big speeches, no big things planned, very quiet the whole weekend. We went out very calm,

but very controlled."

- Donegal manager Mickey Moran

Centrefielder John Gildea had threatened to disturb this equilibrium the week before last when rumours of his and Adrian Sweeney's imminent departure to the US swept the county. Had that been a real danger?

"I suppose it's always a danger. Realistically We sat down and talked about it. The squad is more of a family than anything else and if myself or Adrian or anyone else had wandered off, we'd have been letting everybody down. I made a decision earlier in the year that I was going to stay and I said I'd stand by it. Thankfully it worked out."

In the Meath dressing-room, Sean Boylan quietly wraps up what has been a disappointing season for the county, losing the Leinster title to Dublin and losing their third successive match at Croke Park.

"What I was delighted about out there today was that we never threw in the towel, never stopped having a go, never stopped competing. No matter what went against them they got up and had a go and that's very admirable.

"Today Donegal when they got on top near the end started to play around with the ball and that was it. They did what they had to do to win it and I'm sure they're delighted to be up there having a cut at the All-Ireland.

"It can be difficult to be firing on all cylinders all the time, particularly when you have been fortunate enough to be there or thereabouts near the top as the lads have been for a long time. Everyone knows everything about them."

As ever he declines a knee-jerk response to defeat.

"Our job is to prepare a team as well as we can to be able to compete at the highest level. We have to look at ourselves after today and have to be totally honest about it. But straight after the match it's very hard to look at it because your heart goes out to the fellas that have been playing. I'm not being evasive. That's just the way it is."