Peter Canavan felt that Donegal had it in them to reach a league final, stating that it was "a travesty" that Jim McGuinness' side are not involved in next weekend's Division 1 decider at Croke Park.
A loss to Mayo in Castlebar put pay to Donegal's prospects in adding to the Division 2 title won last year, with victory for the Green and Red securing their place in the final against Kerry.
With Donegal opening their Ulster Championship campaign against Derry a week on Sunday, McGuinness told RTÉ Sport at the start of this month that playing a league final seven days out is "not ideal" for us.
He referenced the short gap to the start of Ulster combat, realising that there is a view out there as to the merits of going full tilt for a league title when your mind is on other matters, namely going deep in your province and the All-Ireland race that follows.
He stated that "a number of teams that want to stay in the division, but they don't want maybe to play in a league final and put themselves under pressure", while also adding "you should have a competition that everybody wants to be in and everybody wants to win."
When the Donegal boss made those comments, his side were joint-top of the Division 1 standings on 8 points, a figure he no doubt felt was enough for them to stay in the section. And survive they did, despite subsequent losses to Tyrone and Mayo.
Speaking on the RTÉ GAA Podcast, two-time league winner Canavan commented on Donegal not pushing themselves to make the final, while also envisaging a change in the calendar that will allow a gap between league and championship.
"Donegal should have been in a league final," he argued.
"It's a travesty, in that in any competition you should be trying to win every match. The way it is at the minute it's not good enough and I'd imagine there will be changes made next year whereby there will definitely be a two-week break between league and championship. That will allow every game to be played the way it should be."
Canavan also touched on Mayo's improvement throughout the league, adding that they are fully merited in being be one game away from winning a second top-flight crown in three years.
"They are deserving to be where they are and for Kevin McStay to bring in so many younger players into the team, it has been a brilliant turnaround and a positive end to the league," he said.
"Mayo had played two games, lost both of them. They played Tyrone in the third game in Castlebar and Tyrone kicked something like ten shots into the goalkeeper's hands. They had the winning of the game but Mayo finished really strong in the last five or six minutes. Since then they have literally not looked back.
"Their second-half performance up in the Athletic Grounds against Armagh, after an uninspiring first half, was wonderful. Whatever happened at half time, Jack Carney came on and they played some brilliant football and have continued in that vein for the rest of the league."
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