Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)
Both Cav plenty in ‘common
COULD Cavan or Roscommon win the All-ireland? Absolutely not.
Indeed, it’s unlikely either will even win their province.
My point is, whatever goals they set at the start of the year, getting out of Division Two was certainly realistic, and they’ve succeeded.
Kevin Mcstay will want to banish memories of last year’s drubbing from Mayo in the replay. Since he took the Roscommon job on his own he’s put manners on a number of defecting players and others who had got above their station.
Some are back involved now but toeing the line.
Roscommon are not world beaters but they’ve been largely consistent in this League, save one or two early results, and Mcstay has got game time into a lot of players.
You could be looking at up to 10,000 from Cavan in
Croke Park tomorrow. After a tough 2017 for Mattie Mcgleenan, he’s extracted some very good performances and had two of the players of the League in Ciaran Brady and the vastly underrated Dara Mcveety.
I expect a very good game but Roscommon might just shade it with their experience and know-how up front.
Before that, Meath and Down are bidding to preserve their Division Two status this afternoon.
It’s an unusual situation for Louth manager Pete Mcgrath in that he can do his native county a favour but you’d have to wonder why he took on this challenge at this stage of his career.
Louth have been so low that you couldn’t make a case for them lifting it sufficiently to beat Meath. As such, the Down-tipperary result could well be meaningless.