Kernan's well able to take the heat

Ulster SFC/Fermanagh v Armagh: Mid-May and Joe Kernan's broad smile has returned with the strong sunshine. "Hot out there today", he remarked, standing in the cool of the tunnel. Although labelled as a revenge match, Armagh's disposal of Fermanagh was business-like, and so conversation quickly turned to the surprising feature of Steven McDonnell failing to land a score from play.

On a day when Armagh rained 2-12 down on Fermanagh, it was an eye-opener. Kernan, though, had his gaze fixed on the bigger picture.

"Did he not?," he mused after receiving the news. "I never checked the note pad. I had them out practising shooting the other night and I thought it would have helped. But obviously not.

"He was carrying an injury, he wasn't 100 per cent. But he was able to run. He was okay. So we will put it down to bad marksmanship."

In keeping with the Armagh tradition, there would be no excuses, in either victory or defeat. A dry day for McDonnell was more than compensated for by vintage performances elsewhere. Not for the first time, Big Joe was asked to talk about Paul McGrane.

"Paul McGrane is Paul McGrane," he began. "He was a colossus today. He caught everything, he ran all day - you saw him tackling in the back line there at the end. The man just has great heart and after the nine or 10 years he is playing . . . he is maturing well."

On through the lines he went. Everything Armagh have done since Fermanagh upended them last summer was interpreted as a reaction to that defeat. The new players Kernan integrated over the league success looked assured yesterday and it was only when they introduced players like Philip Loughran, Aidan O'Rourke and Andy McCann that the sheer difficulty in attaining - and holding down - a place on the team was spelt out.

"One of the problems we had in the past was to put performances together but this is just the start of the championship. I think our heads were wrong last year. Maybe we looked at the next game and you can get caught at that. It was down to attitude and the quality we have in this panel is unreal. The five or six boys who got on would be starting in nearly any other county and they are fighting to get a place. And if they break in, someone else will be disappointed."

This time, however, all the disappointment was stored in the Fermanagh dressingroom. The romantics of last year's championship had a joyless task today but this is the first time under Charlie Mulgrew's stewardship they were not fighting for a result in the last 10 minutes.

"It is very disappointing," admitted the crestfallen Donegal man. "We didn't play well and we will have to find out if that was down to ourselves or Armagh. You have to congratulate Armagh - the scoreline didn't even reflect their dominance. They were dominant in every sector of the field.

"There wasn't much we could do. Everyone knows they are a fine side and we hoped they might have been sated a little by the league but they really kept their focus. So we have to sit down and figure out how we went wrong and then pull ourselves together for the back-door thing."

He winced at the talk of what Fermanagh did last summer.

"Yeah, but there is not point in talking about the previous. We have to forget about the previous and move on."