Having missed the latter part of the National League campaign due to injury, Fermanagh captain, Declan McCusker, is ready to go for Saturday’s clash with Tyrone.

The Ederney club man took over the captaincy following the retirement of Eoin Donnelly and he is looking forward to leading the team out on Brewster Park at the weekend.

McCusker missed the last three leagues through injury but has been rebuilding and back in full training.

Having gotten over his Achilles and calf problems, McCusker is hoping to lead by example on the pitch, letting his actions to the talking.

“It will be nice but that is all smoke and mirrors,” said McCusker of the captaining the side and getting the team ready for the game.

“Everyone gets themselves ready. All that stuff is sorted weeks before not five minutes before you go out onto the pitch.”

And he knows it should not take much to get motivated for a game against neighbours and the reigning Ulster and All-Ireland Champions.

“It is exciting and it’s new and the fact they are All-Ireland champions adds a bit to it but you can’t sit back and watch them.

“If you stand back and look at them for the first 20 minutes then it will be game over, you are just going to have to get stuck in from the start.”

It is the first championship meeting between the sides since 2007 and McCusker knows it will be a huge task to overcome but since the end of the league, the work being done has been positive in the camp.

“I suppose initially I had been concentrating on getting myself fit but since I got back on the pitch it’s been good and we have thrashed out a few things that we didn’t think were working and we’ll try and polish a few things up now before Saturday and go for it.”

Being defensively solid has been a foundation for many Fermanagh teams over the years and McCusker knows this has to be the same again: “We conceded far too much in the league and especially we conceded far too many goals.

“But a lot of the goals, it’s not like teams have been cutting us open. It has been lapses in concentration, normally individually, and that has cost us big time.”

He knows that Fermanagh will have to be on their game at the other end of the pitch, but the league showed they were capable of racking up high scores.

“You are not going to win the game by sitting back. We need to get out and we have to try and hurt them at the other end.

“To try and break fast and get it in early because they are a brilliant defensive team.

“And I know they played very defensive against Kerry but they might not play that way against us because they won’t regard us the same way they regard Kerry.

“To beat Tyrone you need to be getting it right at both ends of the pitch,” said McCusker.

“You need to be taking your own chances and we need to limit theirs and try to not concede any goals.