Monaghan manager Malachy O’Rourke says his side were “delighted” to get over the line against Fermanagh last Sunday in Clones.

The Farney men were 1-10 to 1-6 winners over their neighbours in the end at St Tiernach’s Park, where they had trailed by four points after 17 minutes, and O’Rourke said he was relieved to come through a sticky opener in the backdoor to set-up a showdown with Armagh in Round 2.

“There is no doubt about that, but then the first game after you lose your championship match is always a very tricky game because there can be a little bit of a hangover from losing in the championship, so we sort of expected that to a degree,” O’Rourke stated.

“But then we got off to a bad start and we were chasing the game and with the way Fermanagh set up it is always difficult to peg them back.

“We got to grips with that in the second quarter and towards the end of the first-half we got control of it but we also slackened off a wee bit in the second-half. In fairness to Fermanagh, they kept coming at us and they had a couple of late chances to equalise there. So we’re just delighted to get over the line in the end which is a reversal of last year when they got the dramatic finish and we got it this year.”

Make sure to visit the hoganstand.com match tracker this weekend for live coverage from Leinster and Munster SHC round 5 and the Connacht SFC final between Galway and Roscommon.

Tweet

Most Read Stories