FOR long periods Meath looked like they would secure a place in the last four of the Leinster senior football championship quite comfortably, but as manager Eamonn O’Brien admitted afterwards, his side was relieved to have a second chance.

Laois showed tremendous character to score three points in the final four minutes of extra time in their Leinster SFC quarter-final with Meath at Croke Park.

THE Meath football team of 2009 are beginning to defy all handy categorisation. For a county whose rivers have run dry for a decade now, we would have thought getting to the last eight of the All-Ireland Championship would’ve sated the appetite and anything after that was for embellishment.