Down boss Paddy Tally credited his young stars after the Mourne men’s Division 3 victory over Sligo.

The visitors took a 1-12 to 1-10 win from Collooney to get what they hope will be a promotion push up and running and afterwards new supremo Tally said he was delighted with some of his newcomers’ performances.

“These lads are still learning,” he told The Irish News. “Daniel McCarthy made his debut against Sligo and he really had a good second half. Conor Francis started, that’s Stephen Fegan’s second game and you can see him getting better.

“A player with a half dozen matches under their belt and they’ll look like a different player. We’re trying to blood eight or nine new players and Division 3 is not a bad place to start but they are going to get all the physical contact they need.

“But then it becomes more ruthless in Division 2 and Division 1 and that’s what we aspire to do. We want to get back up there and play at the highest level.

“But this is such a difficult league. You seen over last weekend teams balancing back up again. There’s going to be massive pressure to get something on Saturday night against Westmeath because if you lose, you’re back to square one again. Certainly you’d like for these boys to put themselves in the frame for promotion but it’s too early to say.”

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