Burke hits target with return to leagues’s top tier

Mickey Burke, Meath’s longest serving player, has admitted securing a belated return to Division 1 of the Allianz League was his big target for the year.

The Royal County hasn’t played in Division 1 since 2006 but beat Fermanagh last Sunday to guarantee a return.

Meath can cap a breakthrough campaign by beating Donegal in the Division 2 final at Croke Park tomorrow.

Burke said they’ll travel with confidence but agreed with boss Andy McEntee that the ‘heavy lifting’ of securing promotion is already done.

And the veteran defender said that whatever Meath achieve in the Championship after finally securing promotion is a bonus.

“Promotion is brilliant for this group of players, it means so much to the people,” said powerful Burke. “For me, getting up to Division 1 was almost more important than the Championship.

“Obviously you want to do well in the Championship but just getting up to the point where you’re playing the top teams week in, week out and having them coming to Navan will give supporters and this group of players a massive lift. It’ll be something else and it’s great to get up.”

Burke, also a talented hurler, first joined the Meath football panel in the winter of 2004 when Sean Boylan was in charge.

They were relegated from the old Division 1B under Eamonn Barry in 2006 and failed to secure promotion under subsequent bosses Colm Coyle, Eamonn O’Brien, Seamus McEnaney or Mick O’Dowd.

Burke admitted there were some particularly bad days, like playing in the 2012 league defeat to neighbours Louth which relegated Meath to Division 3.

“My ambition and my hunger never diminished, I love playing for my county,” he said. “It’s something I’m very proud of doing, especially coming from Longwood. But there’d be times when you’d be questioning yourself with different results.

“I remember a few years ago in Navan, Louth giving us a woeful hammering and going down to Division 3 at that stage. Where we are now, there’s three years of hard work after being put into this. I think we’re reaping the rewards and we look really good, really well conditioned and it was paramount that we got up to Division 1.”

Burke said there are a number of reasons why Meath finally made the great leap up this season to join the game’s elite sides.

“We’ve been working hard obviously on our fitness and conditioning, working hard on our football too, just trying to move with the times I suppose,” he said.

Maybe we struggled a bit against the blanket defence in previous years but I thought we showed good composure and resilience against Fermanagh.

"We went four points down but showed really good composure to get back into the game and to get on top. It’s a hard enough division to get out of too. You’re up against a lot of teams that get a lot of men behind the ball.”

Meath’s only defeat in the campaign was to Donegal in Round 2 so they shouldn’t lack motivation tomorrow. “There’s a trophy to play for,” said Burke.

“It will be great for Meath supporters to go up to Croke Park. It’s good to be back there playing and it’ll be a good game between Donegal and ourselves. The main thing for both counties was just to get up. That’s a lot of the hard work done.”