It was standing room only in the Clones press box on Saturday evening. The media circus was in town, ready to write the obituaries for Seán Boylan. By half time, though, they'd thrown the pens down, and watched instead as his team once again outsmarted them as much as the Monaghan team, writes Ian O'Riordan.

In the end, Meath still had to call on their survival instincts, but there was only one thing on Boylan's mind: they're still in the championship and still anything can happen.

"Well, we got there," he said, "but it was some battle to hang on in that second half. We were fortunate to get those scores early on, because with the bit of wind that came Monaghan just took the game to us in the second half.

"We still had some chances, but whether it was fatigue or what, I don't know, but I'd like to think it was the tenacity of Monaghan that we weren't able to get the scores.

"But I was genuinely worried until that final whistle. It was only a few weeks since we'd played Westmeath, and then the replay six days after. And another seven days then until the Kildare game. And suddenly you have to face this. And Coyler!

"So we're thankful to survive, and delighted to win."

For 35 minutes Meath had played some of their best football of the summer, and followed it with some of their worst. It left Boylan a little unsure about the true standing of his team.

"We did get the breaks at the right time. I suppose we still don't really know where we are, except that we're still in the All-Ireland series. And we're thankful for that.

"But I suppose it was unusual, especially with Meath teams being better known for coming from behind. But our problem today was trying to hang in there. They started to trouble us in a lot of places, and without some incredible displays from Darren Fay, Hank Traynor, and Nigel Crawford, I don't think we would have got through."

But he always felt the hunger was still there. "It's only when you win that you know they were right. But I left it to themselves, and they took the responsibility to be mentally right. And they proved they wanted to stay in it."

For Colm Coyle, the former Meath playor and selector, all the damage to his Monaghan team was done in the first half.

"We were totally at sea. Meath were dominating all over the place, and were just physically so much stronger. It was a killer then to concede 1-1 in stoppage time of the first half.

"So I just said to the lads at half time to go out and show a bit of pride, and I think they did that, outscoring them 10 points to two. But overall, I would have to say Meath were the better team.

"But I did tell the Meath lads afterwards that they still have some work to do. If we'd got a couple more frees then who knows what might have happened?"