Malachy O'Rourke could take some consolation from Tyrone's battling extra-time loss to Armagh.

The Red Hands travelled to the BOX-IT Athletic Grounds for yesterday's Ulster SFC preliminary round encounter as underdogs after a disappointing Allianz League Division 2 campaign, but pushed the home side all the way before eventually losing by a point. 

"We knew the performances during the year weren't good enough and we weren't happy with it, but it was different factors at play," the Tyrone manager told BBC NI.

"We were determined to come here today and put in a big performance as we knew we had to, coming to such a difficult place to play championship football.

"We are pleased with how the boys battled for each other right to the end, despite a number of setbacks. I'm just delighted the boys had that response in that as it shows the character of the lads is there."

O'Rourke added: "It wasn't sitting well with them with some of the criticism. We just have to take it [defeat] on the chin and obviously we're disappointed we didn't get the victory.

"We did a lot of things right but going forward we missed a lot of chances. Overall, we're disappointed but I've nothing but pride in the boys."

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