Stephen Bradley is refusing to accept that Shamrock Rovers are champions-elect after last night's 3-0 Tallaght Stadium win over Dundalk.
But The Hoops' boss is thrilled that their seven points' lead over The Lilywhites - with a game in hand - is the perfect position to be in as the title holders continue their FAI Cup bid and face into a hectic autumn of six Europa Conference League group games.
The hosts' three-pronged attack of Rory Gaffney, Richie Towell and Aaron Greene all scored to all but extinguish second placed Dundalk's championship ambitions.
READ MORE: Shamrock Rovers 3-0 Dundalk: History chasing Hoops have one hand on title
"No, the league is not over - we have ten games left," stated Bradley.
"But we knew that this game was really important and we knew that last week in Derry was important in terms of not losing the game.
"The players have done this really well, they've picked up important points in the middle of European football.
"We just have to go and look after our business now and see where it takes us.
"That was our talk a few weeks back - could we have a cushion?
"We knew that with the group stages coming up that we wanted to be in a really strong position in the league to allow us to focus on these games.
"We saw on Thursday against Ferencvaros that it's very difficult with a few injuries. You are stretched with the squad and when you concede a goal against that level of opposition it is tough.
"So it was a case of 'could we be in a really strong position in the league?'. Right now, we look as if we will be in a strong position.
"We spoke in the dressing room on Thursday in Budapest after the game that we knew that this was the game of the week and that we had to focus.
"We knew that Dundalk would come and have a right go at us on the back of Europe.
"I thought the players dealt with all this really well. We were quite comfortable and quite possibly we could have scored more to be honest."
Dundalk's lack of pace in their defence was ruthlessly exploited by The Hoops.
“We’d watched them and we knew where we could hurt them. It’s alright giving players the information.
"I feel like I’m giving them too much information with all the games. But they took it and they implemented it when they crossed the white line.
"They did it to a tee and it worked really well.
"We'll try to win Thursdays game against Ferencvaros.
"Winning the tie is near on impossible against that level of opposition and the goals we’ve given away.
"But we’ll try and win the game like we did against Ludogorets at home. We’ve a good record here in Europe and we want to keep that going.
"What is really important that we know Sunday against Drogheda in the cup is massive.
"We want to win the cup, we want to be in the Aviva so Sunday is really important and they’ve beaten us up there already."
Dundalk boss Stephen O'Donnell lamented the concession of what he felt were poor goals on his side's part.
"We gave away terrible goals, we didn't deal with it well enough," stated O'Donnell.
"We had good passages but if we give away such poor goals, you're going to lose games
"Their gameplan worked better than ours. We play a high line and didn't deal with it well."
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