Newton eyes Division Two football

Roscommon boss Des Newton has learned a lot from his first season in charge of his native county but believes they must get up to Division Two of the league if they are to develop as a football force.

Newton will use the experience as he prepares for his second year in charge after a debut championship season which saw them shock Armagh but fall well short against Galway and now Tyrone.

“We have spent the past seven or eight years in Division Three or Four and we need to get up to a higher level to get consistency.

“We have a lot of talent in that dressing room and more to come in from good minor and U21 teams.

“We can have no complaints about the outcome but we need to get up to a higher level,” added Newton.

Newton said any chance they had of an upset disappeared when Peter Harte scored the game’s only goal from a penalty three minutes after the restart.

“That was the turning point,” Newton admitted. “We were disappointed to be down three points at half-time but there was no coming back after the penalty, although I was pleased with the way we competed. But, at the end of the day, we can have few complaints. We just need to learn from it.”

Tyrone manager Mickey Harte praised the work of Owen Mulligan in helping them get on top and he enthused about the debut display of Darren McCurry, who hit 0-4 after being brought on after 43 minutes.

“He’s only out if minor, and he has been a revelation since he came into our squad,” said Harte. “He came in for an in-house game about a month or five weeks ago and he was that good we said ‘you better stay here young man’. I’m glad we did because he showed his class today. Everyone can learn from him because if he can come in with that type of confidence at a young age, he played like a veteran there, and he knows where the posts are so they are very useful players to have around the place.”