Replying To Furlong1949:  "Thanks for your comments Young_Gael. I enjoy your responses they are well thought out concise and rationale. My post was a bit all over the gaff, going from one topic to another, as long as people can follow me.

I dont disagree with anything you say Young_gael. Yes we are far far far far far from finished product and years behind say the Dubs. I probaly needed to make myself clearer where I think this team is going. Just before that I do think we kind of represent two types of Meath supporters. I think u can divide Meath supporters into pre 2000s supporters and the post 2000s supporters. I think supporters like myself who saw the glory days of 80s and 90s believe in the magic of Meath football little more simply because we saw Meath men and Meath teams do incredible things on football fields and at times perform the miraculous on football field. And those memories linger on in our hearts and minds. We are little bit more optimistic.
The post 2000s supporters have seen very few glimpses of the full force of Meath football, the greatness of Meath eg 2007 v Tyrone and 2010 v Dubs. But games like that since Sean left are few and far between. And are so naturally little less optimistic.

Who knows whats going to happen. I dont think anyone in the county deep dowin sees us winning an All Ireland soon or beating the Dubs soon. I think the defeats Dublin in 2014 and Westmeath in 2015 knocked the stuffing out of Meath football mentally. Many supporters walked away from the county and have never returned. And the believe that Meath could come beat Dublin be top All Ireland contender overnight because simply we are Meath, that way of thinking has vanished.

For me when I talk about progress its not about All Irelands or beating Dublin. We want to be top 6 team basically we r looking to be Monaghan in the next 3 or 4 years. Monaghan are probaly team that are in decline. But Monaghan 2014 to 2018 thats the level. Monaghan have been top div 1 team for 6 years beating top teams in the league and getting results in championship and reaching the quater final stage. Thats basically what we are aiming for, something we havent done since 90s.

Kildare Armagh Cork Down are in the same boat teams trying to break into top 6 or 7 teams, become a div 1 team. Thats the level I am on about. If we in the next 3 years go up and stay div 1 reach supers 8 stage year after years and beat top teams in league and championship and be very competitive that would be sucess. The dream would be to win leinster title in 3 or 4 years time and reach All.Ireland semi final. That would be brillant. That would be as good as it gets.

But winning an All Ireland and leinsters or not on the table. I think Mick O Dowd said this I might be wrong he might not have said this I am not sure. If I am wrong I apologise. Susposedly he said the Meath manager after me wouldnt win the All Ireland but the manager after him will. I think that could be right. Andy McEntee is unlikely to be Meath All Ireland winning manager, his job is to get up to div 1 and stay there and turn Meath into a consitent top 6 team replace Monagham in the top 6. Something we havent done since the 90s.

There is chance Mayo and Monaghan might drop out of top 6 so there is chance for kildare Armagh Cork Meath Down laois Derry to step up. Kildare and Armagh are media favourites but both have done very little v top teams in comparsion to Meaths performances v top teams. They will have the hype but Meath and Cork have the tradition that for 80 yeaes every decade from 30s to 2000s kerry Dublin Galway Cork and Meath were the most consistent top counties winning titles getting finals every decade. Yes Down had great periods of sucess in 60s and 90s Offaly in 60s and 70s and Cavan and Mayo in 1940s 1950s. But the top 5 really were Kerry Dublin Galway Cork and Meath every decade for 80 years. I think Cork can break into top 6 and I think we can also. Its after Andy McEntee era I can see another great Meath team in late 2020s 2030s 2040s the law of averages another great Meath team could emerge. With extraordinary population growth, coachs on the ground, investment from gaa, great work on the ground at underage and great club structure and great tradition I have high hopes for Meath football as this decade goes on.

We need though to start producing top coachs and manager like kerry Dublin Mayo do. When Andy McEntee leaves which hopefully will be in 4 or 5 years after turning us into top 5 or 6 team abd naybe even won leinater or longer meaning he is sucessful we need to see a Meath James Horan Meath Pat Gilroy Meath Stephen Rochford or Meath Malachy O Rourke waiting in the wings to take over. We need top class div 1 manager to replace Andy Mc.

What is top div 1 manager before he gets the senior job look like. Top div 1 manager is Peter keane who won 3 minor All Irelands before kerry senior job or Mickey Harte and Dessie Farrell who won minor and under 21 All Irelands before the senior job. Anothony Cunningham who managed Galway hurlers won U21 All Ireland final and took Galways hurlers to All Ireland hurling final and took Garycastle to All Ireland club final and McGeeney managed kildare seniors to couple of q finals,
Or experienced inter county managers like Banty who managed Monaghan and Meath seniors and Monaghan ladies and Monaghan minors to All Ireland semi final before he took the senior job or Declan Bonner who managed Donegal seniors before and took Donegal to minor All Ireland final before he became Donegal senior manager and Stephen Rochford who won All Ireland clib senior title with Corofin and brought Mayo to two Senior All Ireland finals . And kildare have Jack O Connor who managed teams to 3 All Ireland senior titles and minors U21 and schools All.Irelands before he took the senior kildare job. They are basically div 1 managers, the CV of div 1 manager before they take the senior job. Andy McEntee has similar enough CV with managing Ballyboden to the senior All Ireland and Meath minors to All Ireland final. He is best man to take Meath forward in the present and him Nally or a modern day example of manager/ coach management team. McEntee is The most sucessful Meath manager of his generation, but when he leaves we need to see a Meath Stephen Rochford or Malachy O Rourke or Peter keane n Meath take over. For some reason counties like Meath Down Galway Cork dont produce as many top class inter county coach and managers as say kerry Dublin or Mayo.

Since 2000 only 3 Meath managers have managed inter county teams outside the county eg Hayes with Carlow in early 00s, Coyle with Monaghan in 2003 2004 and kelly with Offaly for one year in this decade. Compare that to kerry or Dublin or Mayo. Look at Mayo with all inter county managers they have produced in last 20 years with John Maughan, John O Mahoney, Peter Forde, Kevin McStay, James Horan, Stephen Rochford, Colm Connelly/Pat Holmes. Even kildare have had manager like Ryan in longford, Carew in Sligo, Rainbow in Carlow and Burke now in Wicklow. We need to see more sucesaful managers from Meat that are sucessful eitheir outside the county with other inter county teams ot inside county bringing Meath team to minor or Under 20 All Ireland finals or All Ireland club final. Thats how top teams pick there manager. At the moment we dont have any candidate with those creditials in Meath to replace Andy McEntee.

I think we are producing young quality footballers and will continue to produce good underage teams and players in the coming years. But we need top class div 1 coachs and managers to take over. Look at how Dublin replace Paul Caffrey with Pat Gilroy with Jim Galvin and then Dessie Farrell. Or how kerry replace Jack O Connor with Pat O Shea then you have Eamon Fitzmaurice and he is replaced with Peter keane. There sucess continues because they have managers with sucessful cv by and large before they took over ( Pat Gilroy is the exception all other managers had strong cv before they took over). So hopefully in next 3 or 4 years we see manager gettiing underage team to All Ireland minor final and especially under 20 final r taking a Meath club to All Ireland senior club final.

So we have good management team, good defence, a new strong midfield partnership, and some exciting young forwards, huge depth on the panel and happy camp who have a good spirit and we can go full 70s mins with best teams in the country in comparsion to 55 to 60s mins last year. However we have goalie issue even though spirit is good our losing streak is awful. We also have only won 1 game in. Croker and cannot get over the line v top teams.

Regards Wicklow or Wexford we are not good enough to take anyone for granted and every year first round of leinster we are awful eg kildare 2017 Longford 2018 Offaly 2019. So hopefully no repeat of Offaly last year. Then you have massive kildare game a 50 50 game. They are weak at the back but have good natural forwards. We are opposite with issues upfront and quality defenders. Which is unusual for Meath we have always better forwards kildare always have good backs. Kildare will be up for this. Beating Meath matters to them. Cavan and kildare and probaly louth after 2010 are three counties that hate Meath the most. And there is proper hate there. These 3 counties when they see that green and gold jersey they can play like men possesed. We are ahead of kildare in terms of development but its a derby and it is 50 50 game. If Meath defenders get the better of there forwards we win. Thats what happenned in the second half of the last years game. If we lose there will criticism. We dont like to lose especially to kildare. If we win and can keep Dublin under 10 points and be competitive to 55 to 60 min will end the season well or anything better that like similar to league game a 4 point that would a real good season to build on and we can build for next yeat. If Meath and kildare meet in semis this will be massive game for both counties. But first wicklow. I think we should start Jordan Morris and Cathal Hickey. They have done enough to start.."

Replying To bobkarlgees:  "Great, post your right about someone replacing Mc Entee. We seem to be starting to turn the corner with producing new players, But we need to be producing mangers aswell. No point in flapping our arms around then the time comes wondering who we are going to get. If we are lucky enough to be a top 6 team its going to be a massive job. Your right Mc Entee was the most qualified, Yet he got Nally in to help out. This will tell you its not a one man job. Nally was a good fit as he knew a lot about Meath football. As he coached in Meath for about 10 years.
Your right also about Wicklow/Wexford lets not take this one lightly, We nearly got stung by Offlay last year. We seem to have gotten a handle on our defense. We have a decent if defense now which allows us the luxury to have Keoghan to roam more and cause havoc. He is not suck/tied up in the back line as he used to. Wuth players like Lavin/Gallagher/ Ryan coming in and been solid players. Midfield is still a problem for us but Jones has been brilliant in the last to games. So maybe we are getting a handle on it. So that just leaves the forwards with walsh coming in has been great for us and now Morris looks really good hopefully we can improve in this area too.
We could give most teams a decent rattle."