Time to give youth its fling-Cavanagh

FORMER Tyrone star Sean Cavanagh believes that it’s now time to give youth its fling after a Championship campaign ended in bitter disappointment for the third year running on Saturday night.

Since lifting Sam Maguire in 2021, the Red Hands have lost more matches than they have won (6 wins, 8 defeats) in knockout football, the latest reversal coming against Roscommon at O’Neill’s Healy Park on Saturday evening.

Three-times All-Ireland winner Cavanagh was among the home support in the six thousand crowd in Omagh watching on as the home side imploded against the Rossies, and he insists that the only way forward now for the County is by introducing some of the exciting crop of youngsters coming through the ranks.

“I think there is a lot more in them. You look at Eoin McElholm coming on, there is real potential there. He brought that energy in the second half while Shea O’Hare is another one to impress. Down the line you are going to see Callum Daly appear in the next year or two as well. So there is a lot of quality there and players who can form a team that should be going to All-Ireland semi and quarter-finals at least.

“ Maybe it’s now time to draft them in and develop those younger lads. We have seen a lot of change this last two or three years but you are now looking to build a team around those younger players. The days of relying on Petey, Matty and Darren are coming to an end.”

Cavanagh was as perplexed as anyone by how much Tyrone malfunctioned in the first half at the weekend, especially given the high stakes. It brought back memories for him of an infamous Championship match that he was involved in.

“That first half was as bad a first half as I remember. I mind being out here myself in 2006 when Derry kept us scoreless in the first half. But for it to be 9-3 to Roscommon at half-time, a three point return from a Tyrone team in the first half just isn’t good enough.

“You are not going to win too many Championship games like that. We only have ourselves to blame really when you leave yourself as vulnerable as that.”

The Moy clubman feels that the lack of consistency which has been an issue for Tyrone for several seasons now was again all too evident at the weekend and it was a flaw which Roscommon were able to exploit

“ It was such an off-colour Tyrone performance. I didn’t see it coming. Ordinarily there is minimum standards you would expect in terms of energy, intent and effort. Bar the first ten or fifteen minutes of the second half they only showed it in patches. They just didn’t show enough.

“Roscommon were always going to be dangerous opposition and in fairness they had the quality up front. We expected McCurry and the Canavans to bring the highest quality. Darragh did that in parts but really and truly it wasn’t enough.”

While praising the effort of Darragh Canavan, Cavanagh felt the support cast around him up front just failed to deliver on Saturday.

“You do need that support around him and Darren has been around a long time. He is 12 or 13 years into his county career. Maybe he hasn’t got that zip and energy that Darragh needs around him. Ruairi was fairly quiet in that first half as well.

“So Tyrone’s attacking players weren’t really coming to the fore while Murtagh, Smith and Cregg were doing that at the other end for Roscommon.

“Sometimes in the past we would be arrogant enough to think we had the attacking threat to hurt teams no matter what but it was Roscommon who went to town on Tyrone.”