New Westmeath football manager Tom Cribbin is confident the team can get back to winning ways next year.

The Lake County failed to win a competitive game in a nightmare 2014 which culminated in Paul Bealin being ousted as manager after just one season.

"It has been a tough time for them, but there's an awful lot of potential in the squad. The aim is to get them playing to the level they are well capable of," Cribbin tells the Irish Independent.

The Clane native has taken great encouragement from the positivity the players have shown since they returned to training a few weeks ago.

"I thought they might be a bit down after this year, but far from it. There's a great energy about them and they are determined to lift things next year," he continued.

"It was a hard year for Paul and the players but we've got to move on now and make sure that 2015 is better. The first priority will be to make sure we stay in Division 2.

"Division 1 was certainly tough going for Westmeath this year but if you look back at many of their games, they did okay for a long time but fell away in the last 15 minutes."

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