Mark Ward admits that the last-gasp defeat to Kildare derailed Meath's league campaign.

The Royal County were going great guns until the Lilywhites inflicted that narrow defeat on them in the third round at Navan - 0-18 to 2-11 - and their campaign has since capitulated, with three successive defeats setting up a winner-takes-all relegation battle with neighbours Louth in Pairc Tailteann this weekend.

Navan O'Mahonys clubman Ward accepts that Kildare was a turning point and also says in today's Irish Independent that criticism of Meath's style of play is unjust:

"Probably not getting the win against Kildare this year in the league had an effect on us. After putting in a good performance, three wins on the trot would have been nice and to beat Kildare would have been great so it just knocked the wind out of our sails a little bit.

"But with the situation we are in now the players really need to stand up and drive it on and make sure we win this game. We couldn't ask for anything more from the management set-up, and it's really down to the players now.

"People talk about our traditional style of Meath football, but we did play that last year in the Leinster championship. We may have overdone that at times and it didn't work for us.

"Coming into the qualifiers, we tried to change it a small bit. In this year's league we have nearly gone the other way. I think the players have overdone some of the changes.

"We just need to mix it up a little bit. We don't want to abandon our traditional style of football but with the way the game has gone, sometimes one style of football isn't going to work.

"It's about trying to get that nice balance between the traditional style and playing it through the hands." Tweet

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