Analysis of Longford vs Wastemeath this Sunday

[Bord na Mona man]

Lets hope that Longford win this one!
End of message.

[Lone Shark]

[Bord na Mona man]

Athlone's finest in mourning!

[black and red exile]

Im probably alone in this thinking but I would much rather be taking on the lake County in Tullamore than going to Pearse park to play Longford. I have a feeling that because of Longford's scoring power they could swing this, from midfield to No 15 they are as good as what is around but of course their main problem is the half and full back lines. Luke Dempsey is a very canny manager and no doubt he will have studied the videos of the Westmeath v Monaghan and Dublin games to come up with a game plan to get one over their fierce neighbours.As Dublin and Derry found out in the last 2 years Pearse park is a bitch of a place to get anything out of.

[Lone Shark]

Dessie tries on the Longford Colours!

[azoffaly]

Well. Thoughts?

I think we'll be in trouble around the middle of the field. Our half backs and half forwards are going to have to hammer in for breaks and want them more. Westmeath are pulling back, crowding midfield and leaving big gaps for Dessie (who will be fitter) and Glennon to exploit. That'll be hard to counter unless we keep our shape and concede the breaking ball, which we can't really afford to do. Maybe we can leave a sweeper back in front of the inside lads, and go with one less in an already crowded middle of the field.

Attacking wise, we can't solo the ball into trouble. Longford tried that too often, and simply ran up blind alleys or lost the ball in contact. Offaly will have to be more direct, and try to get one on one matchups inside. Kieran Gavin did well in the second half yesterday, but I still think that Niall McNamee would do well on him if he gets early ball.

The game will stand to Westmeath, they'll improve, and we have a right job of work on now.

[bula bula]

Yeaterday has given me hope that we can cause the westmeath lads some hassle. They didnt look as assured in defence as we were all meant to believe they were and can definitely see us causing big probs there if we can get enough ball in. This though is where the problem lies. If we can break even around the middle of the park I am sure that we will emerge victorious but management has to come up with a good plan to do this, prob drop some forwards back and crowd the midfield would be the most obvious. Westmeath will defintely be much the better for yesterdays game but all in all I now feel a lot more confident about our chances than before the game.

[DD]

If that was the best of Westmeath we have every chance but personally I think they are capable of a good bit better than that. It's unlikely we're going to win as much ball as them around the middle of field so it's our use of the ball into the full forward line that is critical.
The positive for us is that they are not big scorers and even the like of Glennon who is a good footballer and wins a lot of ball rarely contributes a lot of scores. If we can avoid giving away frees on him and Dolan we have achance of keeping them to around 10-12 pts.
I wouldn't like to see us fall 3 or 4 points behind as they would probably put the dug out or team bus back in front of their goal along with other 12 lads they have there most of time. If we can get ahead and keep the game stretched we have a good chance..

[Square Cab]

What about the dude behind the goals in the Offaly jersey celebrating every Longford score (Particularly Bardens goal)......what a legend!

[Lone Shark]

I'd have felt a lot better if Westmeath hadn't conceded that late burst of scores to Longford. That will have done any "taking down a peg" that needed to be done and made them aware of their vulnerability, for want of a better phrase. We saw very clearly in 2006 how winning matches can bring on a team from game to game and Westmeath will undoubtedly be in a better position by the middle of June.

I don't doubt that a physical hard tackling team like the dubs would take them to the cleaners if they persisted in handpassing like that but I don't think we have the powerful hitters to do that. We have slow powerful hitters that they can run around, but lads like Shane Ryan, Paul Casey, Bryan Cullen - all we have is Ger Rafferty at a push.

I agree that we can't fall too far behind - I can see us then reverting to the slow handpassing game of our own that has been so ineffective and before you know it we'd be destroyed. We'll need primary possession, we'll need McManus to keep his head and not short circuit at the sight of a Westmeath jersey and we'll need somebody to step up and help out Niall. And that's if we are to have a 50/50 chance in my view.