Brendan Hackett has criticised the decision to fix Westmeath's Leinster under 21 championship and NFL games against Meath for the same day.

The local rivals will face off in the Leinster under 21 championship at 2pm in Mullingar today before meeting again in Navan at 7.30pm in the third round of the National League. And Hackett, who is manager of both Westmeath teams, feels it is most unfair on both counties to have to play two important matches at venues more than 30 miles apart within a few hours of one another.

"It's a tough ask for any county to play two matches over the course of a weekend, but to ask ourselves and Meath to play at under 21 and senior level on the very same day is not great form," he said in the Westmeath Independent.

"We've been filtering through a fair few under 21 players into our senior panel in recent months, but obviously they will play with the under 21s this weekend. There's a cross-over of between six to eight players, so it puts a lot of pressure on the senior team, knowing they are short the services of the younger lads."

Hackett's reign as Westmeath senior boss has so far has been overshadowed by the departure of high-profile players Dessie Dolan, John Keane, Derek Heavin and Denis Glennon from the squad. Star forward Glennon was the latest player to withdraw his services last week, but the Monaghan native is refusing to dwell on his or any other player's unavailability.

"You always encounter changes when you're going through a period of transition and re-building. It's just part of the change process," he said.

"I have tried to avoid speaking about individual cases since taking the manager's job and prefer to focus on the players that are available to us. The period of rebuilding we are currently experiencing is a natural occurrence for most counties every five or 10 years. Westmeath won a Leinster title in 2004 but most of those players are coming to the end of their careers now.

"I recognise it's a tough period for supporters as the new players learn and adjust to inter-county football, but personally I love and embrace the challenge of putting a new squad together. And I firmly believe Westmeath will have a very competitive team within two years.

"It's not my policy to speak about individual players and I prefer to focus on the players we have," he added. Tweet

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