Dooher pleased to see Tyrone back on track

PROGRESS to the All-Ireland Quarter Finals is now firmly within the reach of Tyrone after a vital victory on Saturday night which saw them end a worrying championship losing streak since that Sam Maguire success two years ago.

Four defeats from five since those glory days of 2021 was causing some concern for the Red Hands. However, all of that was dealt with in emphatic fashion, and they’re now nicely placed to once more reach the closing stages of the race for a fifth All-Ireland this summer.

First, Tyrone must negotiate the final round-robin tie against Westmeath. Another two points in that one would set them up almost perfectly. Win, and Tyrone’s place in the last eight will be firmly secured.

Joint-manager, Brian Dooher, is well aware of the pitfalls. Nevertheless, his satisfaction at sealing this 0- 13 to 0-11 win over Armagh and awareness of the challenges ahead was clear afterwards.

” A few people have been telling me during the past few weeks about those four championship losses and we wanted to avoid five consecutive defeats. But it’s good to get the win to keep ourselves in the mix,” he said.

” It’s important to get over the line. Our performance was good in parts and could have been even better. There’s a lot to work on both defensively and offensively and there’s another two weeks to get ready for the Westmeath game and look at those things.

” We probably took our foot off a bit at the start of the second half and then got going again to lead by six points. We should then have been pushing on but didn’t.. and when you don’t, you give a team like Armagh a chance to come onto you. They don’t need to be asked twice.

” It certainly could have been a different story at the end. We did things we probably shouldn’t have. In the heat of the moment, it’s hard to know what went wrong and we’ll have a look. But you can’t fault the boys becauseI  thought that they worked really hard.

” They put a shift in and conditions weren’t ideal for either team. It’s good to come out with the win, the performance might not have been all that we wanted, but we will take it and move on.”

Moving on means that clash against Westmeath in what will be the first championship meeting between the counties since 2008. On that occasion, Tyrone edged the Leinster side out on their way to winning a third All-Ireland title.

Whether or not a similar scenario will play out in 2023 remains to be seen. However, the Red Hands will be under no illusions about what’s ahead of them against a team that came close to beating Armagh and led for long stages before losing to Galway at the weekend as well.

There’s a two week break for the counties, and the focus will now be on making the most of the opportunity to focus on the preparations. It’s a
championship which is reaching a critical stage, and both Brian Dooher, Feargal Logan and the Tyrone players will be anxious to make the most of the opportunity to make their mark even further in the race for Sam.