Peter Canavan believes Armagh are primed to take advantage of Galway’s injury woes at Markievicz Park on Sunday and pick up a win that would secure top spot in the All-Ireland SFC Group 1.
Both teams have won two from two in the round-robin group against Derry and Westmeath but Galway will be shorn of key men against Armagh, with Damien Comer among those to remain sidelined.
Speaking on the RTÉ GAA Podcast, Tyrone legend Canavan said Armagh should be in a position to continue their post-Ulster final loss resurgence.
“Without a doubt, it’s advantage Armagh. I don’t think Galway can manage without the quality of those players they’re going to be missing,” he said.
“And if Armagh go at Galway the way they went at Derry and play on the front foot, they’ve the ammunition to do it, they have the strength, and the physicality around the middle sector was very impressive against Derry.
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“And when you bear in mind that two of the players that they brought in have played very little football for them last year, Niall Grimley and Ross McQuillan, they were both superb against Derry and a feature of them in the couple of the games previously was the subs that Kieran McGeeney brought on – Aidan Nugent, Jason Duffy and in particular Oisin O’Neill – all make a big difference when they come on and now he has another two players that he’s unearthed as well or appear to be in really good form.
“So unlike Galway, he has serious decisions to make regarding his first XV and if things aren’t going well, he knows that he has serious strength in depth and there’s an air of confidence about Armagh again.
“On the one hand, after the despair of the Ulster final and losing the Ulster final on penalties and a lot of people were critical once again with the manner in which they didn’t finish Donegal off, McGeeney was coming out of it saying, ‘it’s another game in which nobody was able to beat us in two years of championship football, nobody can put us away’, so he always looking on it from a positive point of view and the players have stuck by him again. That was a great response up in Celtic Park.”
Also speaking on the podcast, Tomás Ó Sé said Comer would be “a huge loss” for Galway, even more so than some of their other key absentees.
“Comer is the one that is unpredictable. He could end up anywhere, do anything, end up at the end of a high ball into the square. He’s a guy that’s hard to mark,” he said.
“I think he’s key to them and he injects a bit of confidence into the rest of the team when they have everybody.
“If Galway had everybody, I would fancy Galway but I think Armagh, I’ve great admiration for how they keep coming back.
“I like the way they carry themselves, I like the way they approach games and I do think the fact that probably Galway are missing (Sean) Kelly who’s an outstanding, aggressive player that can fill so many gaps for them, I just feel that Armagh have the advantage because of Comer and Kelly not being there.”
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Watch an All-Ireland Football Championship double-header, Armagh v Galway (1.45pm) and Dublin v Mayo (3.45pm) on Sunday on RTÉ One and RTÉ Player, follow a live blog on rte.ie/sport and the RTÉ News app and listen to commentary on Sunday Sport on RTÉ Radio 1
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