Having gotten over the semi-final hump after two successive losses, Dessie Farrell immediately rounded on the prevailing narrative concerning an 'inevitable' Dublin-Kerry final.
The Dublin manager made clear at the start of his post-match press conference that anyone who'd made a 'proper' study of Monaghan's form wouldn't have been one bit surprised at their competitiveness.
"I couldn't understand the narrative around this game," Farrell told reporters in the Croke Park media centre.
"Not that I pay a huge amount of attention to it but definitely some of it was getting through and it wasn't making sense to me.
"We knew the type of game that Monaghan were going to bring today and we knew it was going to be a really tough encounter and it took all our grit, determination and experience to get over the line.
"Anyone doing proper analysis on Monaghan would have seen that."
Warming to the theme, Farrell proceeded to pay lofty tribute to Vinnie Corey and his management team, who had belatedly taken over a side who were once again pegged as Division 1 relegation fodder in the off-season.
After a difficult start to the league, in which they shipped a tanking from Kerry in Killarney in Round 2, Monaghan, with a preponderance of over-30s in the side, had improved rapidly over the course of the year to the point they were still in the game down the stretch against the Dubs on Saturday evening.
"I've never seen an improvement in a team like it in my time being involved in management," the Dublin manager insisted.
"I know they had some poor performances earlier but the adjustments they made all the way through. (They're) very very cohesive. Everyone is really comfortable with the gameplan.
"They use their goalkeeper Rory Beggan really well in trying to create overloads and mismatches and you have to be so careful in how you set up against that because they can expose you at the front of your defensive line through those overloads and mismatches."
Ultimately, it was Dublin's experienced heads who came to the fore in the endgame, with the so-called '93's (the crop of gilded talents born in 1993) all registering points after the match had been levelled at 0-12 apiece on 59 minutes.
Brian Fenton, Paul Mannion and Jack McCaffrey landed a trio of points in quick succession to push the lead out to three points - for the first time in the game - by the 63rd minute.
Famously, neither McCaffrey nor Mannion were available to Dublin in the titanic semi-final against Kerry 12 months ago.
Stephen Cluxton, who extended his personal run of championship clean sheets (albeit not without wobble when he spilled a McManus shot shortly before half-time) to 13 games stretching back to 2019, is also back in situ.
That experience, Farrell acknowledged, was invaluable in a tense finale.
"I'm sure a lot of people, including myself, were wondering whether it was going to happen or not with ten minutes to go. We backed ourselves if we were in that position that having those types of players on the pitch at that stage would be a huge help. It proved to be the case today.
"On another day it may not because those senior lads are a little bit older and you never know, every game takes on a life of its own.
"You can't coach it (experience). You can't give it to young fellas - who are brilliant and they're full of energy.
"But there are certain things that life experience teaches you. How to close out big games like that is one of them. We're fortunate to have that type of experience and depth in the squad."
The Dublin manager confirmed that Sean Bugler was withdrawn with a "niggly" calf injury and indicated that Ciaran Kilkenny's continued omission from the starting XV was simply down to building more strength in depth in the team, "which had bitten us" in 2021 and 2022.
"We're ultimately just very happy to get over it," Farrell said.
"We didn't play particularly well, I think it was a nervy performance from us, a semi-final type performance if you like but ultimately showed enough composure and had a good last 10 or 15 minutes and it saw us over the line.
"I think there are over 20 lads in the squad at the minute who have never been in an All-Ireland final, or they've been abroad in the last year or two years.
"An All-Ireland final is a very new experience for them. It's very exciting for those lads, of course. And I'm sure the senior guys are happy to have a taste of it again."
For Monaghan boss Corey, he was quick to revisit that moment on the 65th minute, when Jack McCarron cooly slotted over a score to leave the gap at two points.
Monaghan had been kings at managing the final moments of games in recent weeks, ekeing out crucial late scores against Kildare and Armagh, and their manager was relatively content in that moment.
However, that would be their last score.
"I haven't seen it back but I think in the 65th/66th minute, I think it was 15-13 and - well, you'd like to be ahead - but we were reasonably happy," Corey told RTÉ Sport.
"We had finished games strong and we knew if we got down the field one more time, we could have a one-point game heading down the stretch. It was very much on.
"But Dublin seemed to screw from that point on, just in the last seven or eight minutes. They put the squeeze on us at that point and we didn't have the answers.
"But listen, I don't think it's (the margin) a fair reflection on the game and the effort the boys put in."
Asked what was the winning and losing of the game, Corey's answer was emphatic.
"Turnovers. Turnovers are crucial. When you get to this level and you're playing a top two or top three team, if you give them the ball, you're going to get punished.
"They punished us badly all day on turnovers. They could have hit 1-10 off turnovers. We might have only scored 0-04 from Dublin turnovers. Every time we made a mistake, they just pounced and away they went.
"A few of those were forced by Dublin and they earned the turnover. And a few of those were carelessness on our part."
Corey had been stationed at centre-back the last time Monaghan travelled this deep in the championship in 2018, his 16th season as a Monaghan senior.
In his first year in charge, he has improbably guided them back to the last-four, their fifth trek to the semi-finals in 45 years, having previously reached this far in 1979, 1985 and 1988.
"We would have probably targetted it. In the first meeting of the year, we had a sense there'd be a good chance we'd be in an All-Ireland semi-final - with the new structure and that.
"You had a group of four. You'd be very unlucky to finish bottom of that and be out of that. And once you were in that and had built up a bit of momentum, you'd have a good chance.
"One measure of your year is silverware. And we don't have that. Another measure is how far you went. And we made the last four.
"From a players' point of view, in the old system, depending on how it went, it could take three years to get eight championship games.
"There's positives there, if you build on it. There's no silverware but it wasn't too bad of a year."
Photos at the end of an emotional Conor McManus embracing his parents and family after the game left the impression that the 36-year old great may have played his final game for Monaghan.
Corey certainly won't be shooing him out.
"I don't see why not," the Monaghan boss responded, when asked if he hoped they'd return.
"You've seen there today there was younger boys coming off tight, but the older boys weren’t coming off at all.
"Darren Hughes, Karl O’Connell and Conor McManus played the 70 minutes plus and some of them played against Armagh, 70 plus extra-time. I wouldn't be rushing to judgements there, I think there’s more in the tank in them boys absolutely."
Watch Kerry v Derry (Sunday 4pm) this weekend on RTÉ2 and RTÉ Player, follow a live blog on RTÉ.ie/Sport and the RTÉ News app or listen to live commentary on RTÉ Radio 1
