Football

Armagh start on road to redemption after Down defeat - Rory Grugan

Armagh captain Rory Grugan (left) feels the win over Fermanagh is only the first step on the road to recovery. Pic Seamus Loughran
Armagh captain Rory Grugan (left) feels the win over Fermanagh is only the first step on the road to recovery. Pic Seamus Loughran Armagh captain Rory Grugan (left) feels the win over Fermanagh is only the first step on the road to recovery. Pic Seamus Loughran

BEATING Fermanagh by nine points was "satisfying" – but Armagh captain Rory Grugan accepts there's a long way to go on their road to redemption.

The Orchardmen impressed in disposing of the Erne County on Sunday evening to earn a trip to Westmeath in round 2B of the football qualifiers.

However, Ballymacnab clubman Grugan insisted that positive result has still nowhere near cancelled out the disappointment of the Down defeat in the Ulster SFC quarter-final:

"I think we've a whole lot more to do to make up for that. It's one step. It's nice to get the win and get into the next round, but as far as we're concerned we've a whole lot more to do to make up for that one."

Grugan admitted that the loss to the Mournemen had been a hard one to get over:

"It was a tough few weeks, to be honest, after the Down game. We didn't perform anywhere near our potential, and that's always the hardest thing when you have those regrets, when you don't play to your potential, especially in that second half. We just wanted to go out and try to put things right."

The players took on that task themselves, Grugan said, in response to what the management team told them after the Down defeat:

"It was probably basic enough - the difference between Down and Fermanagh was doing what we'd been coached.

"After the [Down] game people were looking a lot into it, wondering what went wrong, and why we were so flat in the second half.

"It just came back to not doing what we'd tried so hard all year – all that coaching, it was us as players who didn't implement it.

"We wanted to take responsibility for it ourselves, as players, and say `It's up to us to put this right' and go out the next day and do what we've been coached."

The solution was a tricky combination of fire in the bellies and cool heads, according to Grugan:

"Maybe in the second half against Down the hunger and bite wasn't quite there – that was something we wanted to put right as well, I think that was evident [against Fermanagh]."

Before that, though, Armagh had to take their time to take scores: "I think you could see that Fermanagh set up quite similar in the first half to the way Down did in the second half and it took us a wee while to get going again.

"Down got their men back and we maybe lost our composure to a certain extent, in terms of shot selection, with the wind, we weren't getting the right people on the ball. We were forcing shots, taking it into tackle – basically feeding into the way Down wanted us to play.

"We looked at that a lot in the weeks in between and said that against that type of system you just need to move the ball that bit quicker. Try to get into the scoring zone, try to get your shooters on the ball – it clicked a bit better than the Down game.

"We showed a bit of patience and then the points started to tick over – and you could see the confidence grew."

Grugan insisted he always believed that opportunities would turn into scores eventually, even after a series of early wides by the hosts in the Athletic Grounds:

"That's the thing, when you're creating those chances, I trust in the quality of player that we have that eventually they're going to start going over.

"When you're playing against that type of team you're going to have to be very patient. We were still creating plenty of chances despite the numbers they had behind the ball.

"You know it's going to come good when there's people inside like Jamie [Clarke] and Andy [Murnin], and the form Niall Grimley was in with free-taking. It was going to come eventually and to put up 20 points against Fermanagh is a good night's scoring."

Victory above all was Armagh's approach, but they surpassed that aim, to Grugan's pleasure: "We went with the idea that any win at all was good enough, just to get over the line, try to get one win and turn that corner. To do it in the style we did, kicking 20 points, is a nice way to do it.

"It's not only the confidence from the win, but to win with style, playing in that way – good aggression around the middle, lots of kicking, using our inside forwards, it was a satisfying win."