Tyrone joint-manager admitted that the Red Hands were pleased to avoid a fifth consecutive defeat in Championship football, but stressed they will need to improve again after their narrow two-point win over Armagh in Omagh on Saturday night.
As Ulster and All-Ireland champions, Tyrone bowed out of last year’s Championship with back-to-back losses to Derry and Armagh.
They suffered a last-gasp defeat to Monaghan in the Ulster SFC quarter-final in April before losing out to Galway in their Group Two opener in Pearse Stadium.
Read more: Derry can 'put it up to anyone' says Ciaran Meenagh after defeating Donegal
Tyrone were knocked out in the first round in four successive seasons between 1990 and 1993, albeit their Ulster quarter-final loss to Armagh in ’93 was after a replay.
Such records weren’t uppermost in the minds of the current squad as they held off a stubborn fightback from their neighbours in a gripping Championship battle in O’Neills Healy Park.
Dooher was relieved that Tyrone were able to get the victory against an Armagh side who were reduced to 14 men before half-time after Rian O’Neill’s dismissal.
“It is good to get two points for a change. It is good to get a win in the Championship and keep ourselves in the mix,” said Dooher.
“It is important, first and foremost, to get over the line. The performance was good in parts, could have been better.
“There’s a lot of things we can work on defensively and offensively.
“We have another two weeks to get ready for Westmeath and we’ll look at some things and see if we can push on.”
Tyrone were in Armagh’s shoes themselves when Frank Burns was sent off in the first half against Galway.
Dooher said his players failed to kick on after finding themselves six clear in the early stages of the second half and they were indebted to Michael McKernan for making a last-ditch clearance to deny Oisin Conaty after Niall Morgan slipped when in possession in stoppage-time.
“We probably took our foot off a bit (after the red card) and then we got back going again and got it out to six points,” added Dooher.
“That was the point then when we should have been pushing on, and we didn’t. And whenever you don’t push on, and you give a team like Armagh an opportunity to come on to you, they don’t need to be asked twice.
“And they certainly came at us, and all credit to them, they picked off three great scores and we saw at the end-up there, it could have been a different story - we could have been looking at a draw.
“We done things we probably shouldn’t have done. Did we take the right options? We’ll have to sit down and look at it.
"Our decision-making wasn’t the best, but you can’t fault the boys - they worked really hard and put a good shift in. Conditions weren’t simple for either team.”
Tyrone are now in a strong position to qualify for the knockout stages and still have an outside chance of securing a quarter-final berth by topping the group.
However, if they defeat Westmeath in round three, they’ll finish second in the group at worst and progress to the preliminary quarter-finals.
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