Rory Gallagher hails Derry's 'devastating brilliance'

Rory Gallagher struck a relatively businesslike pose after his side ran riot against Clare in Saturday's All-Ireland quarter-final.

While the Ulster final was an infamously cagey affair, both teams setting up to mirror each other, today's quarter-final was a blissfully open contest, Derry's runners availing of the gaps in the Clare defence, running up five goals in a merciless showing.

Gallagher hailed his side's "devastating brilliance" but was swift to acknowledge that improvement would be needed against their semi-final opposition.

"It's great to see that quality coming through, that ruthlessness and what I would call devastating brilliance from individuals," Gallagher told RTÉ Sport afterwards.

"We went out to open up the game quite early and we knew we'd leave a bit of leakiness. We didn't want to be cautious in our approach. We felt that'd play into Clare's hands, if we were overly cautious. Were we happy with some of the goal chances we conceded? Absolutely not. But I suppose we substituted that by dominating an awful lot of the ball.

"Clare don't play with inside players, they play with Keelan Sexton up and even early on, he was defending. We learnt a bit from Roscommon against Clare as well."

Gallagher had been strikingly bullish in advance of the tie and was fairly blunt in touting his team's superiority, pointing to the path they had navigated when coming through Ulster.

"I just felt Clare are a very good side but they haven't been at the business end of the championship. We're after coming from beating three Division 1 teams, I know the quality of our players. You go into games against Donegal, Monaghan and Tyrone, you can't hand on heart say you're going to win. But we felt we were superior players to Clare and had