Sligo manager Tony McEntee says his biggest hope is that his young players are not overawed by the Croke Park experience when they meet Cavan in Sunday's Tailteann Cup semi-final.
McEntee has assembled a young squad with 22 clubs represented and only a third over the age of 25, with seven 21 or under.
Eight out of the 39-man squad are left-footed with 13 of the panel based in the greater Dublin area for most of the season.
Only a few Sligo players have played at Cork Park while Conor Griffin was in Croke Park as a member of the Sligo hurling teams that won the Lory Meagher Cup in 2018 and Nicky Rackard Cup in 2019.
But following dramatic victories over London and Leitrim [after a penalty shoot-out away from home], Sligo are two wins away from the cup.
Would you prefer another win in Leinster or an extra win in Tailteann Cup? - Wexford manager Shane Roche answers the poser after two battles with Offaly this year
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"We are and it’s great to be here but we have to hope now our players come here and do a job," cautioned McEntee. "It is easy to be overwhelmed by the occasion or the game."
Their opponents are grizzly experienced with the slings and arrows of championship fortune. Cavan beat Tipp in the Division 4 decider and gave Dublin a challenge there in the 2020 All-Ireland semi-final – for the first half especially.
But 2002 All-Ireland winner McEntee says his own players are learning and developing all the time.
"After we lost in the championship, we decided as a management that we wanted to crack on and give this competition a good go," he said.
"Then we wondered if the players would have the same attitude so we called a meeting the week after we lost in Connacht and to a man the Sligo players wanted this.
"They want more. One of the most experienced players on the panel is Niall Murphy but he only had 15 championship appearances before this year – and this season already he has added four or five games to that tally.
"This is what we want, what we asked for, more football. A competition that I regard with a lot of positivity and one that was badly needed.
"I am especially impressed with how the 'bigger’ teams like Offaly, Westmeath and Cavan had taken to it – like Cavan would have had provincial aspirations but here they are pushing hard for this."
Yet, McEntee has seen his own side learn from the drama of the previous two wins and he has assembled a top-class backroom team with the likes of former Sligo full-back Noel McGuire, ex-Donegal goalkeeper Paul Durcan and Joe Keane from Crossmolina.
"We are improving but Cavan are too," he said.
"This allows for an extended season, more ball work and training, more opportunity to develop. These additional games are precious.
"The competition has been received very positively and it’s something we’ve been wanting a long time.
"One issue I have with it is the localisation of it this year, the geographical separation – all the teams we played we had already played before and that’s fine, but you would like a different challenge and that will come next year."
All this talk of development. What does it actually mean?
"In one of the games in this competition we played 23 players," McEntee responded.
"It’s fantastic this year because we have played something like 32 players in league and championship – that’s massive.
"We got through games we could have lost and that’s huge for us."
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Follow the All-Ireland Hurling Championship quarter-finals on Saturday, Galway v Cork (1.45pm) and Clare v Wexford (3.45pm), via our live blog on rte.ie/sport or on the RTÉ News app. Watch live coverage on RTÉ2 and RTÉ Player commencing at 1.15pm with live radio commentary on RTÉ Radio 1
Follow the Tailteann Cup semi-finals on Sunday, Sligo v Cavan (1.45pm) and Offaly v Westmeath (4pm), via our live blog on rte.ie/sport or on the RTÉ News app. Watch live coverage on RTÉ2 and RTÉ Player commencing at 1.30pm with live radio commentary on RTÉ Radio 1
