Captain Eoghan Frayne insists upset of Kerry didn't come as a shock to those within Meath's panel
EOGHAN FRAYNE knew giant-killers Meath could topple Kerry.
The Royals shocked Dublin in the Leinster Championship in April, beating their ancient foes for the first time since 2010, but then fell against Louth in the provincial final a fortnight later.
Yet Robbie Brennan's men have bounced back big time in the All-Ireland series.
Meath finished top of Group 2 thanks to Saturday's
It means they will be one of the last eight teams standing in the Championship for the first time since 2019.
And captain Frayne is not surprised — he was sure the team could cause another upset after what they did to the Dubs.
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He said: 'It's a great feeling. I suppose a lot of people probably wrote us off coming into the game but we had the belief, the same as the Dublin game.
'We had the belief in the squad and we knew we could trouble Kerry. It was just great to get over the line in the end and top the group.
'You obviously hear things and you can use certain things to give you a bit of fuel or whatever and things like that.
'You try not to listen to it, to be honest. We had to just focus on ourselves and keep it internal and do the best we could.
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'It was just good to see that what we talked about came off.'
Frayne, 22, made hay against Jack O'Connor's men with 0-5 as Bryan Menton's goal paved the way for Meath's first Championship win over the Kingdom since a 2001 All-Ireland semi-final.
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And the Summerhill man hailed Meath's response to their Leinster final loss against Louth to storm into the quarters in two weekends' time.
He said: 'Yeah, we're really happy with that. It was a tough week after the Leinster final.
'There's a good few young lads in the squad luckily so you don't really think too much about it.
'Maybe the older lads took it a bit tougher. They might have thought it might be their last chance. But we gathered the troops, put the heads down, got back to work and it's showing now.
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It's already proven to be a Championship to remember for the Royals
'There's great competition within the squad. You can see, it's just the next man in.
'When the goal went in, it was probably a big moment. It kind of gave us that momentum just to kind of get on top of them. I'd say that was kind of the turning point.
'You have to back the depth in your squad to come through and everyone coming on has to know their role as best they can. That showed again so credit to the lads on the bench.
'It's very exciting now for Meath football. It was great to see so many kids on the pitch after the game and hopefully we can keep going.'
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