Carroll Lashes County Board

[lovelyhurling]

Carroll lashes county board

Offaly's Brian Carroll
24 June 2009


Offaly hurler Brian Carroll has blasted his own county board for entering into a home and away arrangement with Wexford.

The counties agreed to toss a coin for home advantage for last month's Leinster SHC quarter-final with Wexford Park earning the right to stage the game, though the next provincial meeting will be in O'Connor Park.

But that's no consolation to Carroll, who feels an opportunity was lost as Offaly crashed to a 0-16 to 2-17 defeat.

"Home advantage stood to Wexford at times (in that match)," he said at yesterday's Croke Park launch of the VHI Summer Cúl Camps.

"While we are not going to make excuses - they were better than us on the day - it was a big ask for us, and the county board will have to look at themselves as to why they gave away home advantage.

"Championship hurling is hard enough without having to go to someone's back garden. I can understand from a logistics point of view in the qualifiers, maybe, but when it comes to the Leinster championship, these matches against Wexford, Kilkenny, Laois or Dublin - we might play them every third or fourth year. I don't see where this advantage is, that 'oh, you will get them at home the next time, whenever the next time is'.

"These opportunities might not come around for years. It is not like it (the championship) is run on a league basis where you can get tit for tat over one season. To me it is a ridiculous situation. It is a pure monetary situation. It is not for the benefit of players, certainly not. It was a county board decision, an agreement between the two county boards."

Ironically, under the arrangement, the Offaly footballers would have had home advantage against Wexford had they managed to beat Kildare in the first round of the Leinster championship. The counties will now meet on July 4, but because it's in the All-Ireland qualifiers and Wexford were the first name drawn, they will have home advantage.

[Plain of the Herbs]

I wonder what aspect of Offaly's performance does Carroll think would have been different had the match been elsewhere?

Would they have been able, for example, to win more of their own puck-outs? I doubt it.

More specifically, what aspect of Carroll's own performance does he think would have been improved had the match been elsewhere?

Carroll lashes county board

Offaly's Brian Carroll
24 June 2009


Offaly hurler Brian Carroll has blasted his own county board for entering into a home and away arrangement with Wexford.

The counties agreed to toss a coin for home advantage for last month's Leinster SHC quarter-final with Wexford Park earning the right to stage the game, though the next provincial meeting will be in O'Connor Park.

But that's no consolation to Carroll, who feels an opportunity was lost as Offaly crashed to a 0-16 to 2-17 defeat.

"Home advantage stood to Wexford at times (in that match)," he said at yesterday's Croke Park launch of the VHI Summer Cúl Camps.

"While we are not going to make excuses - they were better than us on the day - it was a big ask for us, and the county board will have to look at themselves as to why they gave away home advantage.

"Championship hurling is hard enough without having to go to someone's back garden. I can understand from a logistics point of view in the qualifiers, maybe, but when it comes to the Leinster championship, these matches against Wexford, Kilkenny, Laois or Dublin - we might play them every third or fourth year. I don't see where this advantage is, that 'oh, you will get them at home the next time, whenever the next time is'.

"These opportunities might not come around for years. It is not like it (the championship) is run on a league basis where you can get tit for tat over one season. To me it is a ridiculous situation. It is a pure monetary situation. It is not for the benefit of players, certainly not. It was a county board decision, an agreement between the two county boards."

Ironically, under the arrangement, the Offaly footballers would have had home advantage against Wexford had they managed to beat Kildare in the first round of the Leinster championship. The counties will now meet on July 4, but because it's in the All-Ireland qualifiers and Wexford were the first name drawn, they will have home advantage.

[Lone Shark]

I'm inclined to agree - this is gibberish of the highest order. It's pure hindsight - it was a bad idea, because we lost, seems to be the gist of it.

Two games in OCP and Wexford with 12,000 at each makes much more sense than two games in Carlow or Kilkenny with around 5,000 each at them. Also, at least this way, Offaly will have a healthy support at one of the two matches, rather than being outnumbered at both.

[lovelyhurling]

I see what he is getting at with the county board though

[Lone Shark]

Do you? Because I don't - home and away arrangements are perfectly logical, it makes sense to try and bring games to local venues rather than going to Portlaoise or Carlow all the time.

Of course it suits the home team, but swings and roundabouts and all that.

[red exile]

i dont agree with conor because we were beaten by the better team on the day but also i dont agree with LONE SHARK on this one, all championship match's should be played at neutral venue's, where no team has an advantage , this home and away 'toss up' is just an element or luck and always causes grievience's ,and anyway we never really have far to travel to a neutral vunue, being smack in the middle of the country

[red exile]

thats brian, not conor

[Bord na Mona man]

i dont agree with conor because we were beaten by the better team on the day but also i dont agree with LONE SHARK on this one, all championship match's should be played at neutral venue's, where no team has an advantage , this home and away 'toss up' is just an element or luck and always causes grievience's

After the iniial toss up, they should work seamlessly.
In theory anyway...

[bracknaghboy]

Brian Carroll shoul be more concerned with how on earth we will deal with the best half back line in the modern game saturday week (they still are the best...the way they dominated Tipp for long periods a month ago). Our half forward line fell apart in the 2nd half against Wexford and didn't win 1 ball . Joe Dooley has a huge job on his hands working out a way around Gardiner and Co. I hope we dont employee the short puck outs because we all seen where that got Galway last week.

[Georgio1]

To some degree I can understand where he is coming from. However, on the other hand we are all paying for OC park, and the more use it gets the better, thus the more home & away arrangements in place,great.We went to Limerick last year and beat them, we beat Wexford only a couple of weeks earlier in the league final with a gutless performance from our forwards.
So I returned to Wex park looking forward to stuffing Banville and co in their backyard. What did we get? Another gutless performance from our forwards, message to Brian, yes we have a strange co board, but you guys have been well looked after, focus on why ye could not compete over 3 games with the Wex backline, be it Wexford, Thurles, or Plough Lane!!