Enniskillen Manager Simon Bradley says that his players are relishing the prospect of facing reigning Ulster and All-Ireland champions Kilcoo this Saturday night in the Athletic Grounds and that it will give them an idea of where they are at in comparison.

The Gaels took their first steps back into the Ulster Club arena in 16 years when defeating Gowna on penalties two weeks ago, and Bradley acknowledges that these are the games his players want to be playing in.

“As I’ve said on numerous occasions, since I got involved with the team, the players have made no secret of the fact that they want to progress to this level and now they have got there they are starting to see the type or preparation and commitment required.

“We are enjoying it; it has been a long season, but we are looking forward to this game on Saturday night to really see where we are at against the All Ireland champions.”

That win over Gowna had a mixture of the good and the bad according, to Bradley.

“I’ve looked back at that game and you can clip it either way; you can clip all the good stuff together and it looks fantastic, and then you clip all the mistakes and errors and turnovers, and it looks awful.

“So, it is trying to find that balance, moving forward, in giving feedback to the players that, yes, you are good enough, but the standard is so high that you have to eliminate the silly mistakes.”

And he stresses that errors will have to be at a premium while the players will need to stay switched on if Enniskillen are to put it up to the Down side.

“I think the players have to buy into what we have been doing at training this last five or six weeks in getting ready for Ulster Club.

“Ulster Club is a different brand of football; your mistakes are super-penalised.

“If you make an error within your own county, you normally have a chance to redeem yourself, but if you make a mistake at this level it is going to be punished and we saw that against Gowna.

“For both their goals there were two or three players who made a simple mistake and a couple of seconds later the ball is in the back of the net.

“You can’t afford to do that against Kilcoo, because that is what they are built on – taking advantage of players switching off.

“But, equally, as I’ve said to our players, we are capable of doing that as well to teams. If they make a mistake, we are able to punish them with the quality we have.

“It is about not making mistakes, and possession of the ball is going to be massive.”

And Bradley knows that when Enniskillen do have possession that they will need to make it count.

“Your possession-to-shot ratio needs to be very high and then your shot-to-score ratio needs to be very high as well, and that’s just the nature of the beast at this level.

“We have to make sure that we get our chances on a regular basis and then we have to make sure we take those chances.”

And he feels that patience is going to be key and it could certainly be a cagey affair at times.

“We want to keep it as tight as we possibly can for as long as we possibly can. We need to take our chances when they come, but to be patient and wait on those chances because they are not going to happen straight away.

“You just have to be very patient when you have the ball and very disciplined when you don’t have it.

“It is a different type of football for our lads to start playing as they would never have done that in the past, but I have to say, in training they are certainly listening and learning very quickly.”

He knows though that Kilcoo will be a huge step up to what the Gaels have faced before but he says that Enniskillen will try to put their own stamp on the game as well.

“Looking at how they have played, Kilcoo can pick and choose what way they play you.

“They do like to go defensive and put 15 behind the ball but, equally, then we have seen plenty of evidence that they can put a full court press on you to so we are planning for both, but we are also planning to try and play our own game against them as well.

“You can’t just go out and defend against them and hope for the best. I think Kilcoo will probably want to send an early message to us but whether we let them do that or not is another thing,” he said.