Donegal’s Gerard Gilmore expressed that there’s positives for the group to bring into next year following the side’s exit from the Christy Ring Cup after defeat to Meath on Saturday.
Mickey McCann’s side faced the Royal county in Letterkenny on Saturday afternoon where the contest was finely poised at the break.
However, the visitors pushed on in Act Two which saw them over the line in a contest where good hurling was played, felt Gilmore.
“I thought we played very well into the breeze in the opening half but we didn’t sustain it into the second half.
“It was a good battle between the two teams. The two teams came out today and just played hurling.
“There were no tactics, we just went at it.”
As we approached the 43rd minute of the second stanza, only two points separated the sides on the scoreboard.
However, Meath struck a major which gave them great momentum and the Setanta clubman stated that it was a moment which may have taken the end out of his team’s sails.
“I think that (the first Meath goal) took the wind out of our sails. That was a blow to us so we just tried to just keep the shackles on, go at it and keep at them.
“I think we brought it back to three or four and then they got another goal which was a mistake on our behalf.”
Saturday’s defeat marked the end of Donegal’s 2026 season.
They will have been disappointed not to have reached the showpiece of the Christy Ring Cup but it was a positive campaign overall, cementing their place in the competition for another term while also securing promotion in the National League.
There’s also a host of young individuals emerging in the squad and the Donegal star discussed that things are progressing in the right direction.
“We set out our stalls at the start of the year to get up to Division 2 because we’ve Westmeath and Carlow next year coming into the division.
“At the end of the day, you want to be playing at the highest level possible and you want to learn.
“You don’t want to be going out and beating teams by 10 or 15 points because you don’t learn anything from that.
“You want to be playing at the highest level you can and it was progress from last year, I think we have more points on the board in the Christy Ring from last year so that’s a plus.
“It’s progress in the right direction so hopefully we can push on now next year.”