Championship defeats are never easy to take. The league’s important but your eye is always on that championship opener, right from the start of the season, so when it doesn’t go your way, it can be a tough blow to recover from.

However, Fermanagh attacker Tomás Corrigan says that they will have to put last Saturday night’s loss to Monaghan quickly behind them and get back to work for the next month’s All Ireland Qualifier.

“We have a week off to go and play with our clubs and re-set and we’ll hopefully be coming back refreshed and determined to make up for the disappointment last week.

“It’s tough and it’s probably one of the reasons why we have the week off this week, to get the heads right. You build up for this first championship game for six or seven months and then you play the game and you get beat and it can be deflating but you can’t afford to be feeling too sorry for yourself or you will be dumped out in the Qualifiers.

“You just have to pick yourself up, work hard and see what the draw brings,” he stated.

Having had a couple of away games in the Qualifiers last year and of course a trip to Clones in Ulster this year, the Fermanagh sharp shooter is hoping that the Qualifier draw produces a home game for the Ernemen.

“The Brewster Park factor would be huge for us, the Fermanagh support there is brilliant and we have a good record there so it would be big if we could get a home draw but it is a total lottery and we will just have to take the draw we are given.”

On Saturday night, Fermanagh put it up to Monaghan for 45 minutes and at that stage only one point separated the sides, but Corrigan admits that when Malachy O’Rourke’s side raised their game, Fermanagh simply didn’t have an answer.

“We conceded two bad scores just before half time that probably took a bit of the wind from our sails going in at half time but I think we started the second half alright for the first ten minutes. However, then Monaghan just stepped it up a gear and we couldn’t live with them which was disappointing.

“Monaghan are a top Division One team at this stage and if you let them get on top of you they will make hay and that’s what they did. We just weren’t good enough and we have to accept that and try and improve over the next few weeks before the Qualifier game,” he added.

The Dublin based player feels there were plenty of positives to take out of their first half performance but acknowledges that it was another game against a top side that they have failed to sustain the level of performance for the full 70 plus minutes.

“I think our first half performance was very good and we were probably on top. We were playing good football and we were unlucky to go in down by two points at half time.

“However, we have to ask ourselves why it is Jekyll one half and Hyde in the other. We were very good for the first half but the game is 70 minutes and the second half is where games are won and lost and we seem to be just collapsing in the second half of these big games.

“It is something that we need to address if we are ever going to beat the teams that are in Division One or indeed get up to that level ourselves. It has proven to be our Achilles’ heel time and again but we will one of these days we will beat one of these bigger teams and that will be a monkey off the back.”

The loss of the likes of Declan McCusker and Ruairi Corrigan to injury was felt by Fermanagh on Saturday night but Corrigan refuses to use it as an excuse although that some of those who were missing will be back for the Qualifiers.

“We have been unfortunate with injuries but you can’t use that as an excuse as every team in every sport has injuries and you just get on with it. Hopefully though we will have Decky McCusker back for the next game and Ruairi possibly could feature too.”

And he knows that a win in that opening round of the Qualifiers would soon change the landscape for Fermanagh in terms of momentum and confidence.

“If we get a win in that first Qualifier game then the whole thing changes again. There would be a spring to your step and you could go on a run again and get to one of those big games but if we are to do that then we have to play for the 70 minutes, not just 35 minutes.”