Cavan clash now a must-win in the race for survival
AN OPENING round defeat won’t make or break a National League season, but very few teams recover from losing their opening two games of the spring series.
And Pete McGrath and his Louth troops will be all too aware of that fact as they head to Cavan on Saturday night.
After picking up a point against Clare last Saturday, Cavan would move three points clear of the Reds with a home win under the Breffni lights and that with some daunting assignments on the horizon, that’s a gap Louth could scarcely hope to close in their remaining five games.
Down, Cavan and Clare were the three games Louth fans would have been targeting for maxiumum points in the race to the magical six-point mark in Division 2.
But defeat to the former last Sunday puts an even greater emphasis on Saturday’s trip to Breffni Park.
Realistically, the Reds will need to beat Cavan and Clare on the final day of the campaign and hope to pick up something in the meantime against Cork (a), Roscommon (h), Tipperary (a) and Meath (h).
With Meath and Roscommon also drawing last weekend, Louth are already on the back foot, as they share bottom spot with Cork, who lost to Munster rivals Tipperary on Saturday.
It will take a few games for the division to take shape, but a second defeat this weekend would already leave Louth adrift.
But Cavan hold no fear for experienced marksman Jim McEneaney and while he’s conscious their hosts have had an extra day to recover, he insists Louth certainly aren’t suffering from an inferiority complex in Division 2.
‘It’s disappointing in the end to lose by six against a team you felt you could go toe-to-toe with,’ revealed the Geraldines attacker. ‘As the game is on, you’re figuring you’re every bit as good as them. We’d feel the same next Saturday going to Breffni Park, we’d fancy ourselves to be every bit as good as Cavan, but we’re going to have to put in a 70-minute performance to show that.’
That was the nub of the issue on Sunday as Louth started brightly against a strong breeze, drifted out of the game for over half an hour either side of half-time, yet still managed to close to within two points of Down in the closing stages.
The target will be to replicate and extend those dominant spells against Cavan.
‘We came out at the start of the second half, and I think it was Tommy got a great score, to get it back to two. You would look to be pushing on then, but we didn’t,’ McEneaney continued. ‘They were the ones that went up a gear and got in front. Then we started working harder and got it back to two, but we didn’t push on from there. So, look it’s 70-minute displays you need at this level, and we didn’t find that today, but we’re going to have to on Saturday and going forward.’
Louth looked like they had the momentum when they cut the gap to two with just over six minutes of normal-time remaining and McEneaney feels that kicking on to win tight games is a trait Louth have to rediscover fast.
‘We had close games last year, where maybe we got it back to two and then we pushed on, or we were ahead and got pulled back and pushed on, and we won those games. I’d never question that side of things, so we’ll keep working hard, we’ll keep doing what we need to to try and get back in the game or to push ahead. It didn’t happen today, and that’s something that we’re going to have to work on.’
He conceded that Division 2 is a less forgiving environment than Louth have been used to in recent years, but if they don’t acclimatise to that new reality, it’ll be a short stay in the second tier.
‘You would have thought we had them on the ropes when we got it back to two, but a couple of mistakes cost us. In Division 2, we’re going to get punished for those errors a bit more than last year or the year before. We just have to keep working on them, make sure that when those opportunities arise that we take them, and that we keep working on that.
‘We were back in it, we had the wind with us, we were pushing up on them and doing a great job of that. We were getting up the field, but we just weren’t as clinical as we would like to be, or are aiming to be at this level, and that’s going to cost you. It cost us today.’
The conditions s and heavy pitch PWDLSD Pts
didn’t suit Louth Tipperary 110062
but McEneaney Down
wasn’t using that t Clare 101001
as an excuse, Cavan
insisting it’s the Roscommon 1 0 1 0 0 1
same for both Meath 1 0 1 0 0 1
teams. Cork 1 0 0 1 -6 0
‘In January it’s s Louth 1001-60
always going to be very soft, it’s just a soft pitch. It holds the water. The wind, obviously was a afctor too, we played into it in the first half, did well enough and ggot in three points down. Then we came out and got it back to two points. But it’s ball handling and basic mistakes that will cost you if you don’t have them on point on a day like that. That’s ultimately what happened.’
But despite the initial disappointment of defeat, McEneaney insists it won’t take long to flush the Down game out of the system and re-focus on Cavan.
‘Cavan had their game on Saturday and we’ve a six-day turnaround now, so it’s going to be all hands on deck. The lads that played the majority of that game, or the whole thing, will concentrate on their recovery over the next 24 hours, get ready for Tuesday night, and then, I’m sure Pete and the lads will have everyone ready.
‘We’ll look at what went wrong today, and make sure we can crack that during the week, so it doesn’t happen again next week.