McNamee: Reaching Leinster final not beyond us

OFFALY captain Niall McNamee admits his county are well-placed to make a stab at reaching their first Leinster SFC final in five years.

The Rhode man, however, is not in the slightest underestimating the visit of Wexford to Tullamore for their Saturday night provincial opener.

However, he feels Offaly, like Wexford, have been given a favourable draw in the province and is not insulted by claims it is the weaker side of the competition.

“If you look at the form in recent years — Dublin winning Leinster five or six times, Kildare almost pipping them a couple of years ago, Meath winning it last year, Laois winning it a while back — the strongest teams are on the opposite side of the draw,” said McNamee.

“It would be fair to say most of the teams on our side have aspirations of reaching the Leinster final. You want to play against the best teams but we know we’re capable of beating every team on our side of the draw.

“Had we been drawn against Dublin at the start of the campaign, I wouldn’t be sure we would have the form built up to beat them.

“But now if we beat Wexford we could get a bit of a run going.”

McNamee and his team-mates have been through their fair share of scrapes. After Gerry Fahy was dumped by the county board in 2004, they picketed. Dissatisfied with Richie Connor’s management in 2009, they revolted again and in came Laois man Tom Cribben.

But McNamee says the mood and belief in the camp has never been as good.

“Tom came in under difficult circumstances but that didn’t matter to him.

“He said he was in for the long haul, that he was here to do a job and that’s the mentality you want. He wanted to build a team and he now has all the boys who should be playing. You’d do well to find lads playing club football who should be on the panel that aren’t on it right now. This is the strongest we have been in years and it’s showing in training. There’s been a massive improvement in sessions. The attitude of all the players is 100%.

“I’m looking forward to the year ahead and I can’t wait for Saturday.

“Now we want to go and get a result for the Offaly people.”

Offaly just missed out on a promotion spot from Division Three on score difference, losing to Westmeath on the last day. But Wexford were in the same situation and actually beat the Faithful County in the round two game.

“For some reason, our away form in the league was stronger than our home in the league and that’s a slight worry going into the game at Tullamore,” admitted McNamee.

“Wexford started the league very well. They nearly beat Dublin last year and next to Kerry and Tyrone they probably have the most consistent line-up in the country.

“They’ve plenty of experience and Jason Ryan’s a good operator and they’ll be difficult to break down. It’s going to be a one or two point game and we’re ready for that.”