Cavan overwhelm Offaly to ease into Tailteann Cup quarter-finals

Cavan cruised through emphatically to the quarter-final of the Tailteann Cup with this 16-point win over Offaly at a sun-drenched Pearse Park, Longford.

When the sides met on 26 February in the league, Cavan ran out comfortable winners, kicking 0-21. In the interim, the Blues' form has been up and down, with losses to Antrim and Fermanagh in rounds six and seven of the league and to Armagh in the Ulster Championship along with a league final win over the Erne men and Tailteann Cup victories over Laois and London.

While both teams were guaranteed to progress from the group stage, the prize at stake here was automatic qualification for the last eight of this competition, with home advantage in that tie, and Cavan convincingly grabbed it.

They were helped by Offaly indiscipline which saw two players dismissed on straight red cards with 20 minutes remaining.

By half-time, Cavan had racked up 1-11, with nine different scorers, and held a seven-point lead.

For the fifth time this season, Mickey Graham’s men conceded a goal in the first 10 minutes and Offaly could have had two more in the first half, with Jack McEvoy hitting the butt of the post and Anton Sullivan, who buried the first goal, later blasting over a point when he really should have hit the target.

Cavan started brightly with a 46-metre Ray Galligan free and an Oisin Kiernan point at the end of a well-worked move.

A Nigel Dunne free got Offaly off the mark but Cavan’s weakness under the high ball manifested itself in the seventh minute when Dunne, spotting an aerial mismatch, fired a mark Crossfield, Cian Reilly misread it and veteran Anton Sullivan fielded and smashed home from close range.

Cavan endured a jittery spell thereafter, registering several poor wides, but