Donegal’s return to the All-Ireland SFC final after an 11-year lapse is all down to Jim McGuinness, according to Paddy McBrearty.

The Donegal captain, who scored 0-3 after replacing fellow 2012 Sam Maguire Cup winner Michael Murphy early in the second half, hailed McGuinness’ impact since reprising his role as manager last year and claims the team ‘massively underachieved’ in his absence.

“When we left here 2014, I didn’t think it would be 2024 until we reached our next semi-final. We massively, massively underachieved from ’14 to ’24 basically, in our eyes,” McBrearty said in the Croke Park media room after Donegal’s demolition of Meath.

“When Jim came back, standards were raised back to where they were and we’re just delighted to be back here, but you know they were a barren couple of years.

“We were winning Ulsters, teams were tipping us to go on and win All-Irelands and we couldn’t do on the big days. Getting this man back obviously for that and getting back to days like this two weeks is gone to be massive.”

The Kilcar sharpshooter added: "We're absolutely delighted in there to be honest. It's been a long road back for this group, and there's not many in the group that have been here before.

"We're delighted to get over the line today, (against) a really, really good Meath team. We'll enjoy this evening, get back to training Tuesday and look forward to the next two weeks."

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