Football

Colm Cavanagh returns for Tyrone's McKenna Cup final date with Donegal

Colm Cavanagh returns to the Tyrone line-up for Saturday's Dr McKenna Cup final
Colm Cavanagh returns to the Tyrone line-up for Saturday's Dr McKenna Cup final Colm Cavanagh returns to the Tyrone line-up for Saturday's Dr McKenna Cup final

AS expected, Tyrone manager Mickey Harte has rung the changes for Saturday's Bank of Ireland Dr McKenna Cup final against Donegal.

The most notable inclusion is Colm Cavanagh at midfield. Last year’s Allstar comes back into the side following his All-Ireland heroics with Moy. Errigal Ciaran’s Ben McDonnell will partner Cavanagh in the middle of the park.

Fellow Moy man Harry Loughran is part of a much-changed attack from the one which saw off Kildare.

Darren McCurry, Ronan McHugh and Ronan O’Neill also start.

The final comes at the perfect time for a Tyrone team searching for consistency, according to defender Hugh Pat McGeary.

The rearranged decider against Donegal gives the Red Hands an extra competitive game between NFL ties against Kildare and Monaghan.

And having picked up their first League points of the season in Newbridge on Sunday, another positive result at the Athletic Grounds would set Mickey Harte’s men up nicely for the short trip to Castleblayney next weekend.

McGeary also sees tomorrow’s clash with Donegal as an opportunity to bring fringe players closer to the cut and thrust of the real action.

“It’s definitely good to have a game like that at this stage, especially for some players who haven’t got a lot of game-time,” he said.

“It really does give the panel a chance, because we have such a big panel, and everybody is not going to get game time every week.

“This is a great opportunity for boys to get game-time, and maybe rest players who have had a lot of game-time coming up to it.”

Having taken just two points from their first three league games, Tyrone need to string some results together in order to haul themselves clear of the relegation zone.

An Ulster derby against Monaghan is next on the NFL fixture list, and McGeary is confident they can once again win on the road.

“Monaghan is a massive, massive game, but all we can do is train and work hard like we have been through the year so far, for that game, and I’m sure we’re well capable of beating them,” McGeary added.

“We’ll not stop here, this is just the start of it. We’re planning to win every game between now and the end of the League, and push on from there.

“Last year we started off well, picked up six points early on and we were sitting lovely at the top of the table.

“It’s just the complete opposite this year, but it will make us focus harder coming towards the end of the league.”

The mood in the Red Hand camp has been transformed following the narrow win over Kildare, according to the Pomeroy man.

Coming off defeats to Galway and Dublin, it was a game they targeted against a side that had also gone into the contest pointless.

“Mickey [Harte] had us really focused on this game, to get us over the line, because we were really under pressure, having picked up no points.

“The mood now, compared to after the Galway game and the Dublin game, is the complete opposite. We’re buzzing, and hopefully we’ll carry that on to the next day.

“The table is so tight, even from top to bottom, there’s very little between teams, so two points is massive. If both teams had come out with a draw, you still would have been iffy about the whole thing. So two points is huge for us.

“The pressure was on our shoulders, and look at the next few games, we’re looking at a lot of big, big teams.

“We knew we had to knuckle down, and we knew it wasn’t going to be an easy game, especially down in Kildare. We knew our backs were going to be against the wall.

“Both teams had to slog it out. Kildare had a one point defeat to Monaghan last week, and they were massively looking to push over the line against us.

“They would have been targeting us as a team they would fancy to beat, especially with our start to the League.”

M O’Neill; A McCrory, C McCarron,


B Burns; M Cassidy, R McNabb,


K McGeary; C Cavanagh, B McDonnell; D McClure, H Loughran, C McCann;


D McCurry, R McHugh, R O’Neill.