By Shaun Casey

A HOUDINI act in Clones on the final day of the National League has a familiar ring to it but this year is slightly different as it’s Conor Laverty’s Down who are trying to pull off the round seven heroics.

On plenty of occasions in the last decade, Monaghan have secured their safety in the final round of the league, with memorable victories over the likes of Galway and Dublin really standing out for their fans in recent years.

However, on Sunday afternoon, Monaghan are looking up rather than down as they hope to claim an immediate return to top-flight football as well as a spot in this year’s Division Two league final.

Down, on the other hand, are battling for their lives and are aiming to fend off a return to the third tier, having just earned promotion to Division Two last season, and it all comes down to the final day.

The Mourne men have given themselves a real fighting chance of staying up after beating Westmeath by the minimum of margins last Saturday evening, their second victory of the campaign.

“We chatted about staying in the division, we didn’t chat about relegation or anything like that,” said Down boss Laverty following their 1-26 to 0-28 triumph over Dermot McCabe’s Westmeath, which ultimately relegated the Leinster side to Division Three.

“We feel that it is still in our own hands and we feel that heading into the last day, we just wanted be in the mix.

“We wanted to take it to the last day and that’s all we chatted about for the two weeks before the Westmeath game.

“We wanted to get a performance and to get a win, not even a performance really – just get a win someway because we have played well in games and got beat so we wanted to get over the line to see where that takes us on the last day.”

On heading to Clones on the last day, Laverty, who coached Monaghan a few years ago, added: “Going to Clones on the last day, there’s been a lot of Houdini acts over these past number of years.

“They (Monaghan) have been brilliant there on the last day.

“A lot of stuff has happened on the last day in Clones so I just hope that we’re on that side of it this time.”

Check you this week’s Gaelic Lives preview show with former Monaghan star Paul Finlay looking ahead to the weekend of action. Brought to you in association with the Everglades Hotel