By Cathal Dervan

Mick O’Dwyer could still see the positives after his Wicklow side were well beaten by Dublin in the semi-final of the O’Byrne Cup on Saturday in front of an Aughrim audience that included Irish soccer legend Paul McGrath.

“Dublin are far more advanced than we are in terms of physical development and overall strength. That was a big step up for us so there was always going to be mistakes,” said O’Dwyer.

“Still, we competed well and if we’d taken some fairly easy chances early in the second half, we’d have been a lot closer.

“The O’Byrne Cup has been good for us. We have had three hard, competitive games which is exactly what we needed. That was an education for us but plenty good will come of it if the players react in the right way and based on what I have seen since I came here, they will.”

Dublin now meet Laois in Sunday’s final and manager Paul Caffrey said: “We created 16 scoring chances and took 13 in the first half. I’d be happy if that were to happen in summer.”

Whelan Cleared

Midfielder Ciaran Whelan has been cleared to play for Dublin in their NFL encounter against Tyrone under the Croke Park floodlights on Saturday week despite picking up facial and rib injuries in a game with his club Raheny last week.

Tyrone continued their preparations for the game with a win over Cavan in the McKenna Cup last weekend, but manager Mickey Harte is looking for improvement before the league clash with the Dubs.

“We have had three games this year and three decent results but in the middle of those games, we had some poor patches of play and we have to try and learn from that, build on it and have less of the poor performances and more of the good performances,” said Harte.

“We have a big, big game coming up against Dublin in Croke Park. We’ll have to up the level of our performance much, much more than we’ve done to date if we want to live with them.”

The GAA has confirmed that 60,000 tickets have already been sold for the game.

McDonald Waits

Mayo star Ciaran McDonald has put off surgery on a back injury and will play through the pain barrier as new boss John O’Mahony plans for the forthcoming National Football League campaign. “Ciaran is currently out with a back injury that is troubling him and it is an injury he had in the run up to the All-Ireland final. He has a disc problem,” revealed O’Mahony.

“Medically, the best solution would be an operation, but that would rule him out for a season and he can’t afford that at this stage of his career so he is trying other avenues.”

GAA Shorts

Jim Greene, beaten in the race to manage the Waterford hurlers by Justin McCarthy, has been nominated to work as a selector alongside McCarthy after Kevin Ryan stepped down. McCarthy must plan for the National League campaign without Paul Flynn as he recovers from knee surgery while Brian Wall will captain the team for the new season . . .

Derry’s Paddy Bradley and Cork’s James Masters have joined the all-stars squad for Saturday’s exhibition game in Dubai . . .

Rory Hanniffy has been named as captain of the Offaly hurlers for the new season.