Armagh coach Conleith Gilligan feels his players are “cute enough” not to underestimate Tyrone in Sunday’s Ulster Senior Football Championship preliminary round clash at the Athletic Grounds.
The Orchard men go into the game as overwhelming favourites to move into a quarter-final against Fermanagh 13 days later, but Gilligan insists they are not thinking along those lines.
Armagh retained their Division One status in the league while Tyrone did likewise in the second division, but the Red Hands had been tipped to do much more at the outset.
Malachy O’Rourke’s side struggled to hit top form, but Gilligan feels Sunday’s derby match could well produce a much different Tyrone challenge and it is one Armagh are ready for.
“The proximity of Armagh to Tyrone, even our younger players would have looked at their younger players winning Hogan Cups and All-Ireland U20s, so there’s no illusion with the younger players as to the quality Tyrone have,” Gilligan said.
“The older players, they’ve been through the mill before and been stung in big games before where they were supposed to be favourites. Last year’s Kerry game was the prime example, where the expectation was that Kerry wouldn’t beat Armagh, and look how that turned out.
“The fact that the league is done now, every team’s looking for that one big win to ignite their summer. From a Tyrone perspective, going to Armagh to do that would be high on their list of priorities.”
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