Longford aim to bounce back from their opening two point home defeat to Fermanagh when they face Lancashire this Sunday at Abbotstown with the game commencing at 1pm.
Lancashire’s debut season in the Lory Meagher Cup was in 2015 and they have reached two Lory Meagher Cup finals in 2018 and 2019, losing both by 1-point margins to Sligo and Leitrim respectively.
In their inaugural league campaign in 2018, they were crowned Division 3B champions with a 7-point victory over Leitrim in the final, only to suffer relegation back to Division 3B in 2019. In 2020, they finished third in the five team Division, while due to the pandemic, no English teams played any matches last year.
The English side will be playing their third league match having won one and lost one of their 2 games to date.
Abbotstown is deemed to be Lancashire’s home venue and their opening league game at the Dublin venue resulted in a resounding 13-point loss to Leitrim going down by 4-16 to 2-09.
However, they travelled to Kingspan Breffni Park to face Cavan in their second league contest and came away with an impressive 11-point victory, scoring 0-23 to Cavan’s 0-12.
Corner-forward and free taker, Danny Connolly top-scored for Lancashire with 12-points, while Kevin Fennelly and Jordan McAllister contributed 4-points and 3-points respectively.
Longford for their part recovered from a poor first half display against title favourites Fermanagh and an eight point half-time deficit, to rally impressively in the second-half, only to lose by 1-10 to 0-11.
Longford’s talismanic forward Joe O’Brien top-scored for the home side with 5-points, with midfielder, Paddy Lynam adding 2-points.
Cathal Mullane impressed as a second-half substitute and should be in contention for a starting place on Sunday, as should Enda Naughton, who was suspended for the Fermanagh game.
There will be live updates on Shannonside-Northern Sound Radio, the Longford GAA twitter page, and the Longford Leader will also be covering the game.