Mickey Harte admitted that Tyrone were beaten by a better team in yesterday's Allianz Football League Division 2 final.

However, he had reason to rue the absence of injured forwards Kyle Coney, Tommy McGuigan and Ronan O'Neill, especially after seeing the impact Padraig Fogarty made following his introduction to the Kildare attack.

"Of course that's a huge loss because quality scoring forwards are at a premium. To lose two of them and Tommy McGuigan to be out of the script as well. They are three quality forwards who'd be good forwards in any company. It's a big loss because that always drains your resources," he said.

The Tyrone manager preferred to praise Kildare rather than criticise his own team who faded badly in the closing 10 minutes.

"You'll always look at these things and say 'Were we bad?' but that would be doing a disservice to Kildare," he continued.

"The way they applied themselves to the game meant they got the result they did. You have to hold your hands up to them.

"Their finishing was excellent. I suppose that's the best time to play your football - when it's getting you across the line. The ultimate thing is that we probably didn't play as well as we have done in many games this year, but Kildare certainly were just a better team today." Tweet

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