By Michael McMullan

ST EUNAN’S manager Barry Meehan is happy with this side’s championship preparations but is expecting a different Kilcar this weekend.

The sides meet on Sunday evening in O’Donnell Park as the Letterkenny outfit begins the defence of their title.

While St Eunan’s missed out on the league final, Kilcar needed three wins to stay clear of the relegation zone.

“They were minus their cohort of county men throughout the league and they probably didn’t do themselves justice,” Meehan said of Sunday’s opponents.

“They’re going to be coming out fighting in the championship now so we’ll have to be prepared for that there.

“Stephen McBrearty was out injured most of the league and he’s back. They’ve got Matthew McLean back and Mark (McHugh),” he said.

Eoin McHugh and Patrick McBrearty are back from county duty, while Ryan McHugh has a shoulder injury to recover from after the All-Ireland final.

“They’ve got everybody back so they’ll be a threat on Sunday so we’re getting ourselves prepared for that now,” Meehan added.

The Donegal format is the same as before. Every team plays four group games to see who makes the quarter-finals. It’s a congested spell but Meehan is looking no further than Sunday. They can’t.

“Our only focus is Kilcar because that’s the nearest game to us, that’s all we know,” he added.

“We have a game after the following week (against Aodh Ruadh) and you don’t even know if you have third or fourth game.

“The fact that we’re at home (against Kilcar), if you don’t get over that first game you could put yourself in a bit of predicament depending on who you draw maybe in round three or four.”

St Eunan’s were missing a host of players during the league but used it to give handful of young players exposure to senior football.

There was a holiday break at the end of the league and the last three weeks have been focussed on the championship the crunch part of the season.

“Things going very well now in preparation for championship,” Meehan added.

Aside from some niggles during training, they aim to be picking from “more or less” a full hand.

“We should be very close to it for the weekend,” he said, stressing the importance to filtering their county contingent back in.

“After the Errigal Ciaran game last year, the lads were straight into the county again like with very little breaks.

“We’ll see if we can integrate them back in over the next few weeks, as best we can without burning them out.

“They put in a massive, massive year, without much of a break so the important thing is that they physically get rested up and psychologically rested.”

Ciarán Moore played all 18 of Donegal’s game. Shane O’Donnell missed one. Shaun Patton had been nursing an ankle injury that forced him out of two games.

Niall O’Donnell will be fresh after just five substitute appearances across the 11 championship games, with Caolan Ward getting some late minutes against Mayo.

“Over the next few weeks, we’ll just integrate them gradually back in,” Meehan said.

“They’re good lads and we know what they can do. They’re in our club a long, long time now.

“Year on year, they’re consistent players that really bring it to the fore whenever we need them in championships. It’ll just be a matter of getting them back in whenever the time’s right.”