Antrim must be better for longer: McEntee

ANTRIM manager Andy McEntee is calling for more consistency for longer periods of games.

Speaking ahead of Saturday’s visit of Armagh, the Saffron boss also doesn’t totally buy into the narrative that it’s a free shot for his side.

After digging their heels in to fight for their right to play on home soil, McEntee admits they’ve backed themselves into a corner and need to focus on putting in a performance.

“There’s always pressure to perform,” McEntee stressed. “We’d always be putting pressure on ourselves to perform. The fact that it’s Armagh means if you don’t perform, you know what’s going to happen.”

“In that regard, we’ve maybe backed ourselves into a corner because if you don’t back up your words with actions, well, you’re letting yourself down to a certain extent.”

Antrim face the All-Ireland champions on the back of a league campaign that ended with relegation from Division Three.

For the last three weeks, they’ve had the sole focus on Saturday’s encounter and McEntee feels the squad is capable of delivering more.

“We’ve seen it throughout the league, that they were capable of some good patches of play and some really good performances at times,” he said.

“Unfortunately, it hasn’t been consistent enough and for long enough periods in games. There were a number of games that we probably could have got something out of throughout the league and we didn’t.

“Ultimately, because we weren’t good enough for long enough. With the new structure, the new rules in place, if you switch off for any amount of time, you can be severely punished.”

McEntee uses the example of going six points down against Kildare in their final league game before bedding in to outscore them 14-3 before half-time.

“With the new rules, kicking into a wind, it can be very hard to win your own kick-outs when the team puts the pressure on you and, ultimately, we couldn’t deal with that,” he added.

“Momentum shifts in games and if you’re on the wrong side of it, it can be very hard to stop it. So, that’ll be the challenge for us.

“We’ve got to make sure we’re in it one play at a time and keep trying to put our best foot forward.”