McGuinness says Roarty's goal was key in laying the foundations for win in Cavan

Jim McGuinness saw his Donegal side get back on track in the All-Ireland SFC round-robin stage with a 3-26 to 1-13 win in Cavan, stressing their finish to the first half was the key part of the game. 

Donegal ran out 19-point winners at Breffni Park to move to the top of Group 1 on points difference, which means all four games in the group to date have been won by the away sides, ahead of the final series of games in two weeks' time. Donegal are due to face Mayo, with Cavan running into Tyrone. 

Donegal will not top the group if Tyrone beat Cavan - plus they’ll have to get their own affairs in order against Mayo first.

READ NEXT: Donegal avoid any slip-up to romp home against Cavan at Breffni Park

"Listen, these games are never over anyway," McGuinness said in Cavan, with his team motoring away to add to a 1-12 to 1-5 interval lead with Finnbarr Roarty scoring the Donegal goal with the last play of the half. In the second, Donegal added further goals from Inishowen pair Conor O'Donnell, who scored 1-4, and Caolan McColgan, while Michael Murphy was taken off having scored seven points to a standing ovation three-quarters of the way through and Shane O'Donnell was named man of the match.

"You know, it's actually, it petered out there, which was very, very unusual, considering that Cavan had the wind in the second half. We were expecting that the battle that started in the first half would continue on into the second half longer. But, you know, they did very well to get the goal just on the stroke of half-time.

"And that settled everybody and allowed us to play the football that we want to play. And there was loads of running in them in the second half, good decisions, people stretching the game and got a lot of scores on the board."

Donegal had been beaten 2-17 to 0-20 by Tyrone in their opening encounter but now every side has won one and lost one, with all four sides in with a chance a fortnight.

"There was a very tough battle there for a long time," McGuinness added of Cavan. "But, you know, they responded really well to everything that was fired at them. And we found that rhythm that we were looking for last week that wasn't there. Too many unforced errors, you know, bad decision-making.

"We are very happy, first and foremost, to get points on the board. It was a very, very important game for us from that point of view. Everybody's on two points now and we'll see how it goes for the next game."