Armagh midfielder Stephen Sheridan hails Orchard County's strength-in-depth

Competition for places around the engine room is driving Armagh’s fine early-season says midfielder Stephen Sheridan.

The Orchard County needed to see off Roscommon in a relegation play-off to retain their Division One status last season, but are top of the pile following the first two weekends of action.

They caused a massive upset when defeating Dublin by five points in Croke Park in their opener and they proved it was no fluke with a well-deserved 2-14 to 0-14 win over All-Ireland champions Tyrone in the Athletic Grounds last Sunday.

That victory was slightly overshadowed by the five red cards issued to Tyrone quartet Padraig Hampsey, Michael McKernan, Peter Harte and Kieran McGeary as well as Armagh’s Greg McCabe following an unsavoury melee in injury-time.

Yet, the result was already a foregone conclusion at that stage as Armagh’s power and pace proved too much for the Red Hands.

The margin of victory might have been greater were it not for a couple of superb saves from Niall Morgan in the first half - including one to deny Sheridan from point-blank range.

Sheridan feels the strength-in-depth in the current squad is one of the main reasons why they’ve started the season so well.

“If you look back at the McKenna Cup, we were struggling for midfielders and put Ciaran Mackin in there, and he’s probably been our best player in every game since then,” said Sheridan.

“The competition is ferocious at the minute. We’ve key men coming back in around the middle.

“We’ve Oisin (O’Neill) coming back in, Ben Crealey got good news that his hamstring isn’t too bad so he’ll be battling for his spot that I was lucky enough to step into.

“The competition is really good. If you want to take your foot off in training, somebody will come