Paul Clarke expects Fermanagh to take a leaf out of Westmeath's book and "park the bus" against Dublin in Sunday's All-Ireland SFC quarter-final.

Westmeath kept the Leinster final competitive for 40 minutes by adopting ultra-defensive tactics, and former Dublin star Clarke is anticipating that the 2015 championship surprise packets will bring a similar game plan to Croke Park this weekend.

"They'll hope to counter-attack quickly and use the energy and the buzz that's still there from reaching this stage to keep themselves at a high level of intensity," the 1995 All-Ireland winning forward said in the Irish News.

"If they do that, get off to a nice start and put a few points on the board, you could have a close game up to half-time. After that, I'd expect the superior fitness of Dublin and the quality of their substitutes coming in to have a big effect."

Clarke, who led Donaghmore-Ashbourne to a Meath SFC final appearance last year, added: "But that is how I see Fermanagh approaching the game. They could come up and play their own game and walk off saying: 'at least we did it our way'. But Jack Sheedy said that when he came up with Longford, played his way and got trounced.

"Fermanagh have the choice to play their own way and suffer the consequences, get exposed in the full back line and, potentially, take a pasting or shut up shop and be remembered as the team that frustrated Dublin.

"As I said, I think they'll take the second option."

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