TYRONE BOSS MICKEY Harte has batted away suggestions that his side were overly cynical in the closing stages of last night’s Round 4 qualifier success against Meath in Croke Park.
The Red Hands were forced to stave off a Meath rally before surviving by claiming a 0-17 to 2-9 win.
But their All-Ireland winning manager defended his side’s tactics in the finale.
“Sure, there was rugby tackles earlier in the game so why would you call one more cynical than the other.
“Both teams committed fouls that were blatent from time to time so I don’t think we can point to the ones at the end and say they were any different to the ones at the start.
“I mean, we had players pulled down in a similar fashion at other times in the game when the momentum was with us.
“We can’t just be looking at this last little bit of the game and saying that’s cynical, it’s not. It happened during the game. Both sides were guilty of it from time to time, so what?”
Cavanagh
Tyrone’s ultimate victory owed a huge amount to a sparkling performance by Sean Cavanagh as the midfielder weighed in with 0-8 to inspire his team to glory.
Harte was effusive in his praise of the Moy club man after the game.
“He was probably Brian Dooher and Peter Canavan and Brian McGuigan all rolled into one today. He just did the things that needed to be done and did them with authority and did them for the 70 minutes.
“Whenever the team was struggling, he just broke the line. He took on responsibility. He didn’t ask anything of the players, he said ‘look at me go.’ That’s really what he did.
“The way he played in the first half, you thought he’ll never be able to stick this again for another 35. And again his frees, a lot of the frees he took today were easy. And they were so crucial.
“That takes a great nerve as well. I couldn’t speak highly enough of Sean Cavanagh today.”
