McEntee: ‘Every game do or die in this division’

SUCH is the nature of the league campaign that Meath won’t have much time to dwell on the win over Tipperary and shortly after the final whistle manager Andy McEntee was already looking ahead to this Saturday night’s round-two clash against Donegal in Ballybofey.

‘Donegal are next and that is a really big step up, but we have to try to go up to Ballybofey and get a result, which not many teams manage to do in Division 1 or Division 2,’ McEntee said.

‘It is better to be going on the back of a win. Winning makes it a little bit easier.

‘You could see it out there - they are all tough games. I suppose on paper people would say that going up to Ballybofey to play Donegal is a tough assignment alright.

‘If anybody had offered us that result this morning we’d have jumped at it. I’m delighted for everybody. There has been a lot of effort gone into this, no more than any other team I’m sure, so it is great to get off to a good start.

‘In all fairness to the lads that were having their very first league outing, they all equipped themselves fairly well. It is good to have new faces coming along to add new energy and a bit of enthusiasm and genuine competition for places.’

McEntee did concede that some aspects of his side’s play in the opening half need to be improved upon.

‘If we had went in 0-7 to 0-2 up at half-time you’d have looked at it as being a good half. I’m really not sure how the penalty came about, the claim was that we tripped somebody.

‘If you take the penalty out of it, being 0-7 to 0-2 up at half-time is something you would have signed for.

‘There were certainly opportunities to put more scores on the board, but defensively we looked pretty solid apart from the scrummage for the penalty.

‘I thought midfield dealt really, really well with a strong midfield pairing from Tipperary. Our finish could have been better and that would have made life a little bit easier for us overall.’

The manager was keen to stress the importance of every match in what is a very competitive division.

‘They are all do-or-die games. Every game in this group is tough. I was talking to Liam (Kearns) before the game and he was saying that with the teams that came down and the teams that came up that this is definitely the strongest Division 2 in the last three years, so every two points is a vital two points.

‘It just goes to show how tight the division is likely to be. We have two draws today, Kildare and Armagh and Fermanagh and Cork, and Donegal had it tight enough against Clare. The truth of the matter is that it comes down to us and how we perform against all those teams.’

With Tipperary drawing level with a little over 15 minutes remaining it was anxious times for the home side, but McEntee said that it was his side’s attitude which pulled them through.

‘I’ve rarely complained about the fellas’ attitude. It’s spot on, it’s exactly where we wanted it to be today.

‘There might have been a little bit of nerves early on, but that’s only to be expected because it’s important to them. If they’re not nervous, they don’t realise what’s going on.

‘So I would say that attitude was very good today and, like somebody said there, a point up or down with 15 minutes to go, playing against a strong breeze, if the attitude wasn’t good we wouldn’t have come through that game. So I think that’s where it came through.’