CAVAN’S Cian Mackey would be happy to see Terry Hyland stay on as manager for another four years.
Saturday’s defeat to Roscommon brought the curtain down on Hyland’s fourth season as Breffni boss and there is speculation that he may not be in the dugout next year.
But Mackey feels that the team is making steady progress under Hyland and his backroom team Anthony Forde, Padraig Dolan and Kevin Downes.
“We’ve never had a problem with Terry and I’d be happy to see him there for another four years,” said Mackey.
“He’s building and we’re improving all the time – it’s little inches that are letting us down each time in Championship matches.
“If you get the rub of the green you never know what is going to happen and that’ll come for us yet.”
Castlerahan forward Mackey was at his industrious best on Saturday. He scored three points and provided the assist for Martin Reilly’s first-minute goal.
Cavan went into the changingrooms at half-time just a point behind but were dealt a hammerblow when they re-emerged for the second half when midfielder Tomas Corr was sent off for striking Roscommon’s Ultan Harney.
“We had a good first half but going down a man just kills you, especially against a good team like them,” said Mackey.
“They were moving well, we were moving well ourselves but 14 men against 15… You might get away with it against some teams, but when you’re playing the top teams and they have an extra man, there’s no winning with it. They’re going to overrun you and that’s what happened – we tried to push forward and we got overrun near the end.
“We scored a lot but we gave the ball away a wee bit too much and that probably was our downfall.”
Cavan have just fallen short of making a real breakthrough three times this year.
First there was a second half no-show in the McKenna Cup final against Tyrone, then they lost to Laois in their last League game when promotion was a possibility and the Breffnimen exited the Ulster Championship after letting a four-point lead slip against bookies’ favourites Monaghan.
“We left it behind in ways but Monaghan came out and showed their character in that game as well,” said Mackey.
“They’re a great team and they’ll run Donegal close for the Ulster title. It’s disappointing to end the year like this, we lost Killian Clarke and Rory Dunne over in London, and you could say that if we had them today it would have been a different story but Roscommon were missing a few and we have a big enough squad to deal with injuries.
“Today wasn’t our day, things didn’t go our way and we’ll have to go back to the drawing board unfortunately.”
The loss of Niall McDermott after 18 minutes was another blow to Cavan’s chances last Saturday. McDermott had scored a brilliant free-kick went he was forced off with an ankle injury.
“I went to go right and the ankle went the other way and I heard a bit of a crack,” he explained after the game.
“For the first five minutes I thought we were going really well, we were moving well and we got a goal and a point and then let them straight back into it and they kicked on from there.”
He has also backed Hyland and his management to remain in place.
“The lads are great, they had us very well prepared and I can’t say a bad word about them, they were great,” he said.
“It’s down to us on the field.”
