Pete McGrath sees Sunday's All-Ireland football qualifier against London as an opportunity for his Louth side to atone for their disastrous Leinster SFC defeat to Carlow.

The Louth manager publicly criticised his players in the wake of the 0-12 to 2-17 drubbing, but says their performance may need to be reassessed after the Barrowsiders also handed Kildare a comprehensive defeat in the next round.

"Carlow went on to beat Kildare, and at no stage in that game did Kildare lead," McGrath pointed out in the Irish News.

"So when you see Carlow doing that, you maybe revise your own performance a bit. Carlow had the momentum of promotion of Division 4 where we hadn't won a game in Division 2. In that situation, whether you like it or not, a team's confidence is brittle.

"We were all disappointed, particularly with the second half performance because the first 25 minutes of the game, Louth probably played the best football they've played this year. In the second half we just seemed to lack a competitive edge. I was very, very disappointed, even verging on being angry.

"So Sunday is an opportunity for redemption of some kind. We know what's at stake, and we know what it will take for us to win the game."

Follow our match tracker this weekend for a feast of action in both the football and hurling championships with live coverage from 15 games across both codes.

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