OPINION: More questions than answers as Tyrone lie in wait

The performance against Down, even in victory, has been greeted with unease by supporters. With Tyrone on the horizon on Saturday, Cavan look to be under pressure, writes PAUL FITZPATRICK.

A win is a win is a win, as the saying goes. But sometimes a win can feel like a loss.

That's the strange position Cavan find themselves in after a performance against Down last Saturday which could most kindly be described as unconvincing.

Some followers of long standing have described Saturday's showing as the worst they have seen. We wouldn't subscribe to that viewpoint but it certainly was one of the most depressing, even in victory. Why? It's all about the context.

Five years ago, Terry Hyland rolled out an ultra-defensive system with the aim of making the team – at maybe its lowest ebb around then – competitive again.

There was a short term bounce from that – it restored pride and carried us all the way to a quarter-final - but the 2014 championship that followed was a write-off. The Cavan players were no longer enjoying their football; it looked like it had become a chore and this was reflected in the results.

Thus, in Hyland's final two years, his team began to play a more adventurous style. They conceded more but scored freely and by 2016, for the first time in a while, all of the best footballers in the county had committed.
Cavan were going places at last. They gained promotion to the top flight for the first time in over 15 years and, having lost to the eventual Ulster champions by a point in 2015, lost to them this time in a replay. Was that progress? It seemed like it.

By year's end, it appeared that another percentage point or two, a redoubling of the efforts, might have tipped the scales. Instead, the Blues went backwards.

Players left that first winter and have yet to return. More followed 12 months later. 

And then, Mattie McGleenan's public pronouncements about playing an attacking style of football began to look contradictory as the highest scoring team in the land in 2016 became the lowest scorers the following year, albeit in a higher division.

Given the exodus of talented, experienced players in the last off-season, McGleenan deserves great credit for steering the team to promotion in the league this year.

The suspicion at the time, however, that it was an unusually weak division has since been confirmed by championship results.

Six sides – Cavan, Tipperary, Down, Clare, Louth and Cork – have been tanked already in championship, losing matches by eight, 11, 13, 22, 10 and 17 points respectively. That's an extraordinary series of results.

Meath, meanwhile, lost to Division 3 Longford for the first time in 36 years and were knocked out in round one of the qualifiers. Louth, admittedly bottom of Division 2, lost to two Division 4 teams in championship.

The odd ones out are Roscommon, who defeated Leitrim but lost to Galway in the Connacht final by a respectable four points.

And, it's fair to say too that Cavan's limp Ulster Championship exit at the hands of Donegal – dreadful as it was - doesn't look as bad now that Declan Bonner's side have coasted to the Ulster title but what is most alarming is that McGleenan has returned to a style of play which was not fit for purpose, as we have said, four years ago.

And what's even worse is that Cavan are not particularly good at it. Despite bolting the door with three sweepers at times against Down, the 1/3 favourites shipped 0-10 in the first half. McGleenan stated during the league that the aim is to keep opponents to 15 scores. Cavan have since set up defensively yet Down still managed that.

As noted, this ultra-defensive structure is a road to nowhere, detrimental in the long term. For the Cavan management to resort to it now can only be taken as a sign that they do not have faith in their team to play any other way. When you feel the need to rip up the road map and start again halfway through a journey, it's because you were lost.

Of course, Cavan deserve credit for not giving up the ghost against Down, something McGleenan highlighted – then again, that's surely the least supporters can expect from any team.

As a spectacle, the match was very poor, despite what the pundits may say (“They were two teams who both suffered heavy defeats in the Ulster Championship but they produced a great game,” stated Des Cahill on The Sunday Game, with a straight face).

Judging by his post-match comments, there has been a sea change in the manager's approach. McGleenan, by his own admission an advocate of attacking football, is now not in the slightest bit concerned about how his team wins so long as they do.

“It's very hard to please people,” he said after the match on Saturday. 

“You've supporters and commentators there, they want you to play open, attacking football or they want you to play defensive football if you're too open at the back. So you're trying to please people which isn't easy. We have got through this game and that's all that matters to me right now.”

His last point was a salient one. So much time, effort and money goes into preparing for senior inter-county football now that it has become a results business.

What matters, inarguably, is winning and Cavan won last Saturday. So what's the problem?

Well, Breffni supporters, yearning for a breakthrough, might be unrealistically demanding at times and certainly have a tendancy to be negative but they are a knowledgeable crowd, too.

And the fans could clearly see that Cavan looked confused tactically, flooding back personnel into defence, many of whom didn't seem to know exactly what role they were expected to perform. Their attacking play was devoid of ideas for long spells, too.

Had Down not suffered a freakish set of circumstances – losing their best players early in the game, concession of a howler of a goal – they would have won the game. And Down, while capable of big results, are not a consistently good team – they have won only eight of their last 30 matches in league and championship.

Those are the reasons why there was so much gloom around after a championship win against Ulster opposition, something which is normally a cause for celebration.

The faintly embarrassing fracas after the match didn't help. There appears to have been a leadership deficit in the Cavan dressing-room for some years now and it seems to have manifested itself in narrow defeats and, at times, in a lack of discipline on the field.

Cavan had players sent off on straight red cards in knock-out championship matches in 2015 and 2016 which arguably cost them those games. In 2013, there was a brawl against Fermanagh after a qualifier in Kingspan Breffni. The following year, there was the pre-match melee in Armagh. 

And now we've had a post-match one which could deprive the team of two starting players for the big test against Tyrone.

Considering that, for some reason, Cavan sleepwalked into a situation where so many established, experienced players were not on the panel, a tussle with Tyrone on Saturday evening is suddenly a very daunting prospect.

It's 35 years since Cavan beat the Red Hands in championship football. Then again, in one way, tough as it is, this is a perfect draw for Cavan.

This Cavan squad craves the confidence and validation that a big scalp in championship would deliver. Now, they have the opportunity. 

Remember what we said about it being a results business? If it happens, it would undoubtedly be the most impressive championship win since the 1997 Ulster SFC final and would affirm every decision that McGleenan has made to date – and then some - and silence the doubters.

On the evidence of last Saturday, however, it looks a very tall order.