MICKEY Harte has paid a glowing tribute to Tyrone ace Cathal McShane following his man-of-the-match display in last weekend’s NFL win over Dublin.
Harte praised the brilliant attitude of McShane and revealed how the versatile Owen Roes clubman bounced back after being substituted against Cavan a couple of weeks earlier.
“That’s what is admirable about him,” Harte explained.
“He’s still a relatively young lad and he just takes things on. He is not fazed by errors and mistakes, and they do happen, but I’ve always told him: ‘If you’re making mistakes, you’re certainly getting involved in the game.’
“It’s not that we want to be making mistakes – we don’t advocate them – but I do admire the way he deals with them.
“Against Cavan he had three or four turnovers against him and we took him off in the second half. Next night at training, it didn’t faze him, he was bursting past people and through people and we knew with his training in the last week or so he was going to come into the Dublin game.”
McShane missed two first half chances but he also bagged 1-2 (0-1 free, 0-1 mark) and added two more points in the second period.
The 2015 U21 All-Ireland winner was one of the first to break into the Tyrone seniors that same year. It was his stoppage-time effort that forced last year’s All-Ireland Qualifier against Meath to extra-time as Tyrone made it all the way to the All-Ireland final.
McShane didn’t feature in Tyrone’s disappointing League defeat to Mayo but has started every other game and scored in those games too.
The 23-year-old is capable of playing anywhere among the middle eight but has impressed in the full-forward position this season and has established a telepathic understanding with Mattie Donnelly.
The Red Hands find themselves in with a shout of reaching this season’s Division One final after slaying the Dubs last Saturday night.
They have to beat Galway next Sunday and hope Monaghan can upset Mayo to stand a chance to facing Kerry in the March 31 decider at Croke Park.
"Where there’s light there is hope because even though we lost our couple of games, the way results went we knew there was a fighting chance of getting second place. But other things have to happen, it’s out of our hands.
"At the same time we had to get wins to take ourselves away from relegation. Now that we’re quite safe, we will give it our best shot [against Galway] and if we happen to win it, it’ll depend on other results as well. I’m glad that we’re safe in Division One and if the next result is good and takes us to a better place, that’s good, but if it doesn’t but I think we will be quite happy with the back end of our League form.”
While Tyrone converted three advanced marks on Saturday night, Harte is still not convinced of the merits of the experimental rule that will be reviewed before the start of this year’s Championship.
“I wouldn’t like to pass judgement on it yet. I’m not quite sure. I don’t see it as being very detrimental to the game but I’m not sure if it does a lot for it either.”
