The blanket defence may not be pretty to watch but Jim Gavin says teams are 'playing within the rules'.

Dublin struggled to break down Derry at Croke Park last night but their extra bit of class up front told in the closing stages and they prevailed on a scoreline of 0-8 to 0-4.

"We won the game and overall I think we controlled it," Gavin remarked to Setanta Sports after the final whistle. "We have a few things to work on but we played a very defensive team.

"Teams are playing within the rules and managers and players are entitled to play within the rules. From a Dublin perspective we see it as a great challenge whether teams go man-to-man or go zonal or blanket defence.

"We can't control how teams play, we're just happy with the challenge that we face every day that we take to the park."

Is patience the key to overcoming a blanket defence?

"It's one of the components yeah, along with good vision, reading of the defence and movement off the ball. There's lots of attributes that you need to break it down. I think we displayed it in patches there today.

"Against that defence I think we had some good performances. Our guys stuck at it. I think defensively our structure was good, we only conceded one point in the second-half."

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