Louth manager Ger Brennan has said the impact of Storm Éowyn and poor weather in the county so far this year led to him making 10 changes from the team named during the week in the victory over Westmeath in Allianz Football League Division 2.
A fisted goal by substitute Sean Reynolds decided an exciting clash in Mullingar.
Brennan said he realised the day before the game that he would have to change two thirds of his entire planned selection.
The Wee County manager referenced the storm which hit Ireland on Friday morning, and being unable to get enough sessions for some players.
"We had quite an experienced team named [during the week]," Brennan said.
"We pushed hard to try to get some of those lads onto the field, being conscious of how important that first game is, and between the storm, the frost a few weeks ago and all sorts of injuries and not getting the chance to play different lads, we had to kind of think on our feet.
"On Saturday morning, we had to make an awful lot of changes to the set-up, but I'm very happy with the guys who came in.
"I think there were five or six debuts there to the senior team, which is a huge positive for Louth football going forward, and the return of a couple of older guys who played before Emmet Carolan and Andy McDonald, they are big inclusions as well."
Easy scores by free-kicks being brought forward due to dissent and three on three infringements had a negative impact on Louth in the game, with Brennan putting the blame at his own door.
"That's the manager's fault, I didn't have the lads ready for that. We were poor on that," he said of the rule breaches before offering an assessment of the game.
"We were very lucky to come out of this with two points. At times over the years, even from playing experience, sometimes you win these dirty matches and that is the sign of a team with a good bond.
"But if you were to be critical of our performance, there are huge areas where we can improve upon, just in possession, kickouts, both ours and theirs, and defensively we were just very, very loose.
"To be fair to Westmeath, they caused an awful lot of problems, they worked really, really hard today. I thought they outworked us in the second and third quarter of the game.
"In the last quarter, maybe the experience of being in Division 2 last year possibly stood to Louth in terms of having a slight bit more in the legs, but at the same time, fair play to Dermot McCabe and Westmeath's super performance.
"There's a lot of learnings there, I think. We have to nail down the new rules, particularly who's staying up and who's staying back.
"I think that's probably one of the obvious learnings for us today."
