McKeown aims to bring good times back to Boyneside

friendly against Milton Keynes and asked me to go down on the Tuesday just to have a look and get to know the lads and the set-up and I enjoyed it.

‘It’s well done Giller [John Gill] and Mark [Kinsella] as well. They are very good coaches and since I’ve been here it’s been brilliant and the training has been, I think, a step up from what I’ve been used to at Longford and I’ve been very impressed with the training facilities as well.

‘The fact it’s the First Division doesn’t put me off at all. That’s what I said to the lads last week, coming off the game against Shels. It was weird, nice to win a game again because it’s been a long time coming - that’s what it felt like. All you want to do is play and if you are winning it’s a bonus. So far so good.’

Despite Drogheda making hard work of his former club on Friday last, McKeown insisted they were never going to have things easy against the men from Stradbrook.

‘We knew going into the game it was going to be tough. Cabinteely have just come off the bottom of the table and they put it up to us, so it was tough to break them down.

‘I know there was the 0-0 draw the last time and that’s what we were saying in training all week, that the league position doesn’t do them justice. We trained well all week and knew going into the game that we had the quality and that if we worked hard we would grind them down eventually.

‘They are just very well organised. In fairness to them, they do have a couple of good players.p I was there last year when we finished bottom of theth league, but the games were always tough [for other teams] and it’s the same this year, so it was a great win and we look to next week now.

‘That’s three wins on the bounce and we’ve nothing to fear.e Limerick are miles ahead of everyone,e but we’ll go out next week against them and hopefully pick up three points. If we play well,w you never know.’

Despite having represented DundalkD at Under-19 level in 2011 and 2012 and made the match-day squad for the first team at Oriel Park, McKeown suggested it’s Drogheda United that he has the bigger affinity with.

‘I live in Collon and went to school in Drogheda and when I was younger watching Drogheda United was a big thing on a Friday night.

‘I started secondary school in 2006 when they were up there as the best team in the league, so I know a lot about them and that why I wanted to come here and push on and get them promoted because it’s obviously not a First Division club, it’s a Premier Division club.

‘The plan is to push on and play for them in the Premier next year because I feel that’s where I’m able to play. I just never got the chance at Longford.’