League Football Round Up

[Silken Thomas]

Edenderry 3-16
Clonbullogue 1-05

Killer Farrell stole the show with 1-7 from full forward.
Bracknagh I hear shipped an unmerciful beating too...
Out with the old and in with the who

Any other results across the divisions?
It's harder now to find out ever since the Offaly Independant turned utterly avoidable and it's free

[theman]

well when clonbullogue are missing 5 of there main players and edenderry have nearly a full team! Of course its gona be a walkover. Clonbullogue never took there chances in the 1st half and gave away to many frees. To say st.broughans underage isnt working is a farce. Bracknagh missing 9 starting players due to a wedding. Of course they were gona get a beating. Obviously an edenderry man silken tomas. Its ok,yee wil be avoiding relegation this year. No where near winning senior championship!

[Hocker]

Football League Division 1
Shannonbridge 1-7 Tullamore 0-3;
Ferbane 1-11 St Brigid’s 1-5;
Shamrocks 0-10 Rhode 0-10.

Football League Division 2

Doon 6-16 Bracknagh 0-3;
Edenderry 3-16 Clonbullogue 1-5;
Tubber 1-12 Ballyfore 0-9;
Walsh Island 1-14 Ballycumber 0-7;
Raheen 2-7 Erin Rovers 1-9.

[Silken Thomas]

well when clonbullogue are missing 5 of there main players and edenderry have nearly a full team! Of course its gona be a walkover. Clonbullogue never took there chances in the 1st half and gave away to many frees. To say st.broughans underage isnt working is a farce. Bracknagh missing 9 starting players due to a wedding. Of course they were gona get a beating. Obviously an edenderry man silken tomas. Its ok,yee wil be avoiding relegation this year. No where near winning senior championship!

I will not entertain some sort of North Offaly mud slinging but I will offer you this...
Apologies to a rashly phrased post.

To say St. Broughan's underage system is a failure is not true though in fairness they are your words not mine. They have amassed 'B' underage titles recently and competed gamely at 'A' level culminating in an impressive Under 14 A title last year. Talent is noted.

This is however a pet peeve of mine.
Here we have three Intermediate clubs ie Walsh Island, Clonbullogue and Bracknagh supplying one underage team.
Mathematics alone deems this policy dangerous.
The structures should be in place to allow these clubs to compete at a level that best suits them.
If it's Minor 'C' so be it.
If it's 13 a side likewise.
Plenty of other neighbouring Counties have the respective structure. Why not us?

Small clubs need all the players they can get.

As for Bracknagh their profile is vintage to say the least.
The Rumour Mill has produced a raft of retirements which most people know they do not need.

[bracknaghboy]

Well Silken some good points made there. On the issue of Bracknagh I wont go into too much detail but the club is in serious trouble if half of what I heard in relation to lads not playing is true. If it is the case then a rapid fall to junior is on the cards this year.

[talent spotter]

It is very early in the year to start making predictions about relegation
to junior and the like. Its fair to say at this stage certain teams with
some good training work done would be leagues ahead of those starting late.
If Bracknagh are relegated to junior then that is where they belong.
If they prove themselves on the playing field to be better than the worst
team in the intermediate championship, regardless of their age profile
then they will belong at that level!

[Lone Shark]

I'd say that any small club, if they're likely to be missing some key players, are well advised to be aware of the trapdoors that lie ahead. Bracknagh obviously will do their best with what they have, but the players aren't stupid, they'll know that if they've been weakened significantly, that'll take a toll. However there is a big difference between lads not being available in February and lads not being available in July.

However I will say this - it's not always obvious at the start of the year who will make the drop from the intermediate grade, since you never know what club will see the wheels fall off entirely. To put it another way, Kilcormac/Killoughey certainly have more talent than some of the clubs at intermediate level, but they just did not get out of first gear last year and thus they fell back. You never know what club that could happen to this year.

[talent spotter]

K/K may have more talent than a lot of other intermediate teams, but in the white
heat of championship football, talent only goes a certain distance.
Either through hurling precedence or other motivation, or lack there of,
they lost out in a three way play off to be relegated to Junior last year.
The whole ethos of the GAA, community, spirit, team work, belief can
drive a team to far beyond their perceived worth.

[Lone Shark]

I wouldn't disagree with any of that at all - however the point is that K/K wouldn't have been on many people's short list for relegation at the start of the year and no-one could say for certain who might suffer from a similar malaise in 2009.

Having said that, you'd love someone to take hold of football in K/K and really work on it. There's huge potential in there. Even the team they fielded in the under 21 would be a decent junior side if they didn't have a single other player to call on.

[talent spotter]

Very true, and if K/K were to concentrate on football for the season,
they would be an extremely strong junior team, probably to the detriment of
other junior clubs, as they (K/K) really belong at a higher grade.

[bracknaghboy]

KK gave Ballyfore a walkover in a religation game last year. Crazy behaviour. Hard to believe they were senior a couple of years ago.

[Archangel]

Clara V Tullamore looks the pick of the bunch this weekend, as both lost last week. I know it's not huge priority right now, but teams don't like going on a losing streak.....

[Silken Thomas]

Reading between the lines so Clara lost to Gracefield?
Can anyone fill in the missing results

I would be very surprised at anything other than the 'Hawks' snaring their prey.
They're back training longer, missing less personel and would surely have more to prove. Time will tell.

[Lone Shark]

Sunday 22nd February 2009
Football Division 1
Team 1 Score Score Team 2 Venue Comment
Shannonbridge 1-7 0-3 Tullamore Shannonbridge
Ferbane 1-11 1-5 St. Brigids Ferbane
Walsh Island 1-14 0-7 Ballycumber Walsh Island
Gracefield 2-6 0-9 Clara Gracefield
Shamrocks 0-10 0-10 Rhode Mucklagh
Saturday 21st February 2009
Football Division 2
Team 1 Score Score Team 2 Venue Comment
Edenderry 3-16 1-5 Clonbullogue Edenderry
Doon 6-16 0-3 Bracknagh Doon
Ballyfore 0-9 1-12 Tubber Ballyfore
Friday 20th February 2009
Football Division 2
Team 1 Score Score Team 2 Venue Comment
Raheen 2-7 1-9 Erin Rovers Geashill


Based on that, Tullamore appear to be way off the pace required, whereas Clara were at least competitive. The Rhode Gracefield game should be decent enough too, though I have heard that Rhode were barely out of second gear last week.

[Archangel]

I see this year it's now 4 Divisions, unlike last year's 5. This gives teams more games. We had 7 league games last year, this year we will have 11. Plenty of football between now and championship.