TYRONE BOSS MICKEY Harte was bullish about his side’s prospects for the remainder of the season following yesterday’s 12-point victory over Tipperary at Semple Stadium.
Harte believes that the Red Hands can be a match for anybody left in the All-Ireland football championship – but only if they produce their very best form.
If we can play to our top level, then I wouldn’t be particularly scared of anybody but if we don’t play at our top level, I don’t think many people would be scared of us either.
Harte also hailed the discipline of his players as they came through an encounter that had been billed as a ‘grudge’ match.
There was plenty of history between the two counties following that tempestuous All-Ireland U21 final in May.
But while Tipp lost their heads in the second half, Tyrone held theirs and got the job done with minimum fuss.
“I was very happy with our players and how disciplined they were,” Harte said.
“It’s not easy sometimes when these schemozzles get started, people can lose the plot and lose their place in the team and stuff like that.
“I’d be very happy with the way they dealt with that side of the contest.
“I think they showed in the second half that far from distracting our players, it maybe galvanised them.”
Tyrone led by just a point at half-time, 0-7 to 0-6, but won by 12 after producing a dominant second half display.
But Harte insisted that he was never worried, even though his side had to play against the breeze in the second half.
“Strangely enough, even though it was a very tight game at half-time, I felt we were playing a lot of good football and probably just mishandling the ball at vital times up front.
“We were picking poor options, playing the ball into the corners where it was difficult to get a shot from.
“People were taking bad shot selections so there was a lot of things going on that we knew we could improve on but we were very happy with the workrate and the effort they were putting in.
“Unforced errors were our biggest problem and our lack of clinical finishing, which left a very big game on our hands at half-time.
“We had to sit down and do something about it. Thankfully the players did that.”
