Allianz National Football League Division Two: Fermanagh 0-10 Armagh 3-14
A RAMPANT Armagh may have hit a whopping 3-14 in rainy Brewster Park on Saturday night to reassert their claims on a Division One place next season – but their impressive display was put in the shade after a truly disastrous showing by relegation-haunted Fermanagh.
Reporters ducked for cover under the tiny concrete corridors that attach onto the changing rooms in the corner of the ground. Everyone expected a long wait, but the defeated manager emerged quicker than anticipated to deliver a post-match interview that was brutally honest and spared no-one.
For Ryan McMenamin, it was the “worst performance” he’s been involved in since hooking up with the Ernemen three years ago.
“Everything we talked about before the match, everything we planned for kind of went out the window,” he said. “I have to take that, I have to look at myself and ask if I am doing enough for this team. To me, it's disappointing. It's Tier Two football that we played. We made a lot of mistakes and mistakes have been killing us all this year.”
The former Tyrone player sensed the atmosphere among his players was flat during the warm-up and speculated that everyone in the camp had been “papering over the cracks - a point in it here, a point in it there. Armagh really punished us and could have had seven goals.”
On this kind of form, Fermanagh are odds-on to be relegated and playing Tier Two football this summer unless they can produce the goods in their final two games against Clare (a) and Laois (h) to save themselves.
With the spectre of Tier Two football hanging over them, McMenamin described in explicit terms what he thought of the new Championship format.
“The GAA has gone too corporate... I can see as manager of a small county that Croke Park don’t give a f**k about us at the bottom. Maybe you are not meant to say that but that is my feeling on it.
“[The creation of] Tier Two is basically for big teams. That is the narrative because everyone knows if Tyrone or Donegal were to be beaten in the first round under the old system they would have had four games to play; now they have only two.
“They have too many games and they want the big teams fresh. That is what the Super 8’s is all about. Everyone knows it is for the big teams, the top 16. Could it have been done better? Yes, you could have a Tier Two but not with a five or six week break in between. It is madness.”
If apathy hasn’t already set in among the Fermanagh players, it almost certainly will once the National League concludes, McMenamin insists.
“You could have boys going to America. It is going to be a challenge for the county board. You have to ask the question: how are the county board going to fund this?
“And if you are a manager in the middle of the club season, you are going to say: ‘Sure why bother with that?’ If a man wants to go to America for the summer who am I to say no. I have no contract with him.”
Fermanagh’s night wasn’t helped when they lost two of their best players midfielder Eoin Donnelly and full-back Che Cullen in the warm-up.
Kinawley’s James Allen was thrown in at the deep end to deputise for Cullen – a decision that McMenamin admitted backfired.
“It was unfair on James Allen to throw him in there. It was harsh on him and I probably made the wrong call starting him. Look, I should have gone for a more experienced player. It was a gamble that didn’t pay off.”
Facing into sheeting rain and wind, Fermanagh’s night of misery got underway after just three minutes when Jamie Clarke slotted the ball under the home side’s goalkeeper James McGrath after Patrick Burns found the Armagh attacker with a fine kick pass.
The Orchard men raced into a 1-4 to no score lead before Stephen McGullion opened Fermanagh’s account after 26 minutes.
The Ernemen had a couple of chances before they finally ended their scoring drought.
Eoin McManus, a late replacement for attacker Conall Jones, missed two placed balls and fledgling county player Darragh McGurn spurned a decent goal-scoring opportunity.
The home got men behind the ball but Armagh shredded their defensive cordons with ease. Jarlath Og Burns breezed through from deep to find his range and Rian O’Neill shifted from his right to left foot to grab another eye-catching score as the visitors led 1-8 to 0-3 at the interval.
In Rian and younger brother Oisin, Armagh now have clear thinkers in front of the opposition posts, the Crossmaglen brothers sharing six points.
Aidan Nugent impressed again in attack, finding the net in the 51st minute after Fermanagh failed to deal with a high ball.
But the best of the three-pointers on the night was Aidan Forker’s cool finish nine minutes earlier that knocked the stuffing out of McMenamin’s side.
Forker, who pushed further forward in the second half, passed the ball into the net after brilliant approach play from Jarlath Og Burns and Mark Shields.
Armagh should have had more goals while Fermanagh just about climbed into double figures in stoppage time through Ryan Jones.
Normally, the spotlight would shine on all the good play that Armagh produced - but when you perform as badly as Fermanagh did, there was only one discussion that dominated upon leaving Enniskillen on Saturday night.
Fermanagh: J McGrath; J Cassidy, N Cosgrove, K McDonnell; E Shiels, J McMahon (0-1), Shane McGullion; R Jones (0-2), R O’Callaghan; A Breen (0-1), U Kelm, C Corrigan (0-1); Stephen McGullion (0-1), E McManus (0-4, 0-3 frees), D McGurn Subs: D McCusker for N Cosgrove (30), K Connor for J Cassidy (38), T Corrigan for Shane McGullion (38), C Jones for R O’Callaghan (44), T Bogue for Stephen McGullion (55)
Yellow cards: E McManus (23), Shane McGullion (32), J Cassidy (35), D McCusker (40), C Corrigan (43)
Armagh: B Hughes; P Burns, B Donaghy, A Forker (1-0); R Kennedy, S Sheridan, M Shiels; N Grimley (0-1), O O’Neill (0-2); R Grugan (0-3 frees), S Campbell, J Og Burns (0-1); A Nugent (1-2), R O’Neill (0-4, 0-1 ’45), J Clarke (1-0) Subs: J Duffy (0-1) for S Campbell (55), E Rafferty for J Clarke (65), J Morgan for P Burns (63), G McCabe for R Grugan (68), A McKay for N Grimley (68)
Yellow cards: R O’Neill (73), M Shields (54), P Burns (59)
Referee: C Branagan (Down)
