So a little bit of the pressure up at Ballybofey seems to be off. Prior to Saturday evening's draw with rivals Derry there had been a surprising number of takers for the theory that Charlie McGeever's reign would come to an end if the club suffered a sixth successive defeat.

It's a long way in a short space of time from the acclaim he received for getting the club to the FAI Cup final as well as within a whisker of third place in the league last season.

It is in those last few weeks before the summer break that McGeever's current difficulties clearly have their origins, though. Having guided his players to the cup final against Bray, qualification for one of the European competitions looked on.

In the event a spectacular collapse in the club's league form ruled them out of the InterToto Cup which would have been acceptable had the three-match tussle with what most people felt to be an inferior Bray side not ended just as badly.

To emerge from the season with nothing must have been terribly deflating for everybody at Finn Park. While he must take his share of the responsibility, it must have been especially rough on McGeever.

Certainly his task of acquiring a quality central midfielder and striker over the summer months would have been that much easier had he been offering the prospect of playing in Europe with a club that had shown itself capable of winning trophies.

For his striker, McGeever seems to have pinned his hopes on Paul Wilkinson, who is currently waiting for an insurance claim to be sorted out in England before he can complete any move back home to Ireland.

McGeever has repeatedly, and understandably, made the point that the club's early schedule makes their current predicament that much more understandable. Playing Cork, St Patrick's and Shelbourne so early on certainly didn't help things.

Nevertheless Drogheda (this week at United Park), Waterford, Galway and Sligo, while all undoubtedly tricky in their own right, should afford an opportunity for Finn Harps to make up some of the lost ground.

Having taken over a club in the middle of a boardroom power struggle and without a team to talk of, McGeever has brought Harps forward at a rate that the likes of this season's newly-promoted sides, Galway and Drogheda, can only marvel at.

The team has finished ninth, eighth and fourth in those seasons, reaching the latter stages of the cup twice along the way. Behind the scenes there is a well-established school of excellence and last season the reserve team won the Ulster Senior League for the first time while the youths won the Ulster and Donegal Youth League.

Both of these successes have been achieved in a remarkably short space of time and, given the relative weakness of senior football in the area, it may be some time before the benefits really begin to be felt.

If McGeever has had the coolness to wait until he feels he can buy well, then those who have been amongst the most eager to see him depart might do well to wait until he has finished building the team before deciding that the time has come to start the whole painful process all over again.