Offaly vs. Limerick NHL 28/03/2010

[leinsterman]

To be fair on dylan hayden he played well against galway in the walsh cup and cork in the first league game of the year.
i still think he is good enough to be on the team somewhere there's plenty of hurling in dylan hayden.

i agree about playing both joe brady and ger healion on the same team one of them would be enough on the team,
joe brady has done very well in the last two games he came on in so i would start him.
iam suprise that derek molloy is left off the team, i think he's the only one able to catch the high ball on the half forward line.

[GreatDayForTheParish]

That was the worst Offaly hurling performance in a long, long time. I don't like being so blunt on such a public forum but I believe it to be eminently preferable than saying a 'win is a win'. To be hanging on for dear life against such a weak Limerick team is a terrible indictment of the Offaly management. Chastening stuff for a supporter.

What's so maddeningly frustrating is that I actually believe the best Offaly 15, played in their best positions and coached smartly would actually be quite decent. Whatever about some players having off days (that can happen to anyone) what really baffles me is the same non-performing players being given chance upon chance, match after match. Without laboring the point too severely , I would very much like someone to tell me what Joe Brady has scored for Offaly as a forward. I would not mark him as a danger man at club level, the notion of playing him at inter-county is just plain amateurish.
Daniel Currams is another who, although more talented as a forward, has had few good games for Offaly. How many good games for Offaly has he played in the last 2 years ? I believe he has potential, he's still young, but surely for the player himself and for the panel he should be made work harder for a starting place.

Bright notes today for Offaly were Hanniffy, Rigney, Dooley and Del, Hanniffy and Del being the stand-outs. That was about it. Healion in fairness took his two goals well (the second one especially so) but can look very slow at times, something that will not improve as the summer moves on. Cleary hit some needless wides from long frees, Mahon perpetually drops the head that split second before attempting to catch a ball and we were painfully slow to the breaking ball at times. The Limerick centre back was allowed do as he wanted for the majority of the day and he duly took full advantage.

[esb_lad]

I feel that Paul Cleary has had too many chances at this stage.. A lovely man to chat,however he is in the jersey a long time with little effect.. His role as a centre back is especially questionable, however I find it difficult to pin-point his natural position as he lacks pace and is also quite weak under the high ball.. What are other people's views on this? I am also sick of seeing countless penalties being saved.. Being a rynaghs man i was at a championship match against shamrocks 2 or 3 years back and was shocked at derek molloys striking power and accuracy.. he blasted several placed balls to the net,some from long distance and is a real cool head under pressure... Perhaps he should take over the penalty duties! That is of course when himself,kevin brady(centre back),diarmuid h and brendan murphy rightfully make their returns!

[Bord na Mona man]

Luckily I was away for this one. However the closer the match came, the more convinced I was that Offaly were going to be in real trouble.
By last night I was advising a few lads who like a flutter to hoover up any handicap bet they could get on Limerick.
At least Offaly will be in Division 1 next year!

[GreatDayForTheParish]

Being a rynaghs man i was at a championship match against shamrocks 2 or 3 years back and was shocked at derek molloys striking power and accuracy.. he blasted several placed balls to the net,some from long distance and is a real cool head under pressure... Perhaps he should take over the penalty duties! That is of course when himself,kevin brady(centre back),diarmuid h and brendan murphy rightfully make their returns!

Offaly have missed an alarming amount of penalties in the last year. I agree, Molloy should be given a go. If I'm not mistaken, I believe he scored three goals from placed balls for Shamrocks against Kinnitty last year.

[leinsterman]

Well i said on friday that if we got it hard to beat this limerick team we are at nothing, and we did get it hard and could of
lost it in the end with limerick missing a goal near the end.

don't know what's going on with joe dooley and his selectors we threw away a lead in the first half and got it back with
the switching of bergin and brady, came out in the second half and put bergin back in fullforward and brady centre forward
i doesn't make sense. as for our back line it was all over the place at time's today, david kenny has to know that he can't
catch every ball if he bat out today he could of stopped at least two limerick goal's.

well i suppose at the end of the day it was all about getting a win to stay in the top division one and we have done that.
the last two games against waterford and tipp and we are under no pressure to win them now after todays win.
so i hope we go and give a good rattle at waterford and tipp in the next two game's. i was disappoint with the display
of offaly today they can hurl better, but went i got home i met a laois man and he said offaly were lucky today
i said he doesn't matter we are in division 1 next year wouldn't laois and limerick love to say that up uibh fhaili .

[bracknaghboy]

Knew this would come down to wire. We left happy today that we will get more top action next year (assuming they dont fix all 7 games away that is!) but the performance was dire to say the least. Lets be clear about it this, the limerick team with the exception of #'s 7, 9 and 15 were very very limited. They had no goal threat but ended up with 3 goals today! Defensively they failed to field any high balls at all and their midfield was sloopy with pocession but still mopped up everything particularly in the 2nd half. The Limerick midfield also hit 4 or 5 bad wides mid 2nd half when playing ball into the forwards should have been the option. Its hard to know exactly what sort of game Offaly are trying to play. Healion and Brady are not mobile enough and would surely be exposed in the faster paced summer matches? Is there a specific reason why Oakley is not out there. He caught the first ball that landed on him when introduced and won a vital free. Haverty as predicted by the boys earlier on this thread was at it again today bigtime! What a terrible referee. He let some bad tackles go and then blew up for stupid little things like lads tripping themselves up (this happened twice). Also he was insisting that players stand well back when a free was being taken but for some strange reason the Offaly lads ignored him and he brought the ball up for Limerick 3 times. Hoping to get to make a weekend of it next week in Waterford and hoping to see this team start to play with the shackles of potential relegation now off!!!

[Slieve Bloom Man]

Am very disappointed after today. Thank God we won. At least we stay in division 1 but the standard of hurling today was poor. Offaly are not as bad as today. But where does the blame lay on today's performance. I'd say mostly with management but a few of the more experienced players need to take a look at themselves and their will to win and fight for possesion. Hopefully lessons will be learned from today. Firstly I hope Dooley admits Offaly played badly and not just say Limerick put up a great fight. However, I think he'll come out with his usual speal.

[Plain of the Herbs]

Nothing unexpected in O’Connor Park today, then. Offaly hit the ball to a decent Limerick team, struggled to get it back, were bamboozled by the simplest of angled runs and handpasses, and were lucky the Limerick freetaker’s radar was a bit off and that Limerick fluffed a late goalscoring chance.

Michael Haverty was up to his usual tricks, though Offaly made it easy for him poking in the hurl when they were a yard behind the man in possession. And standing within 20m of the freetaker is inviting the free to be moved up. Offaly getting to the ball first, winning it in the air and controlling the game would have minimised Haverty’s opportunities to penalise Offaly. That wasn’t to be.

In short, Offaly gave a sucker an even break – and almost paid a heavy price.

That said, Offaly’s primary target – that of division 1 survival – has been achieved with two matches to spare. They can now move on and begin preparation for the championship and the new manager next year will get his term underway in division 1.

The fact is that this Limerick team are a decent side, with ne’er a bad hurler on the team. The many changes they made during the match show the signs of a management still searching for the right blend. That’ll come.

The two red helmets on the stand side of the attack in the first half were particularly troublesome, while Derek Morkan struggled with James O’Brien. The Limerick goalkeeper pucked it out too far in the second half and crowded his forwards as the Offaly midfield dropped back.

The only thing were can take from the Offaly camp with any certainty is that Kevin Brady will NOT be hurled in defence. Rightly or wrongly, that’s clear. Wrongly in my view.

So who wrote Limerick off beforehand to such an extent only the media herd? The same media who told us Portumna would ate Ballyhale, who tell us Galway are perennial All-Ireland hurling contenders and the Dubs perennial football title contenders. ‘Tis time they left the observers to make up their own minds on matters on the field. I don't bet on people but I thought 1/2 Offaly and 2/1 Limerick would have been more realistic odds with Haverty's appointment making it even money the pair of them.

Nothing more to see here. Move on. The Championship is coming.

[esb_lad]

The only thing were can take from the Offaly camp with any certainty is that Kevin Brady will NOT be hurled in defence. Rightly or wrongly, that’s clear. Wrongly in my view.

Why is this so? He's a natural half back in my opinion and a good one at that!

[Efan]

Firstly well done to all, a second season of Division hurling can only do us good. When you look at Wexford, Leix, Carlow and Antrim battling it out to in all likelihood play Clare in a league final I am delighted that we will not be part of that scrap next season (mind you 1 up 1 down remains a disgrace and the HDC should hang their heads in shame on that one).
We were in control of the game twice and let Limerick back into it through defensive lapses. At the about the 20 min mark we were 7 points up and cursing and really should have kicked on from there to kill the game. We created a number of good potential goal opportunities but were guilty of not taking the best option for the team to fully carve Limerick open and looked more like we were chasing the game rather than trying to kill it.

Michael Haverty was really really bad. As suggested before hand he was zealot in not allowing ant player tackle legitimately with the hurl but made a few classic “soft free to the team playing catch up” decisions. I would say he had al least a 3-4 point impact on the result and would have feared for his hide coming in under the stand if Limerick had snuck it.

I see there is another thread on penalties …. Avoid hitting it between neck and hip height and don’t hit it directly at the keeper … it’s not an exercise in bursting the sliotar.

[flyingsaucer]

[quote="GreatDayForTheParish"]


Bright notes today for Offaly were Hanniffy, Rigney, Dooley and Del, Hanniffy and Del being the stand-outs. That was about it. Healion in fairness took his two goals well.

i agree,very shaky performance,but another year in div 1 will do offaly good and that was the main goal this year.hanniffy and morkan stood out in 2nd half,morkan has been one of our best players so far this season. plain of the herbs suggested he struggled with james obrien when in fact he marked paudie mc namara for most of the game and two other players during the game.the managment in my opinion were slow at the changes, joe brady was struggling and it took them a long time to do anything about it. hopefully with the threat of relegation off their backs we might see a better performance against waterford next sunday. and on a side note was'nt the referee a disgrace.....

[leinsterman]

Bright notes today for Offaly were Hanniffy, Rigney, Dooley and Del, Hanniffy and Del being the stand-outs. That was about it. Healion in fairness took his two goals well.

i agree,very shaky performance,but another year in div 1 will do offaly good and that was the main goal this year.hanniffy and morkan stood out in 2nd half,morkan has been one of our best players so far this season. plain of the herbs suggested he struggled with james obrien when in fact he marked paudie mc namara for most of the game and two other players during the game.the managment in my opinion were slow at the changes, joe brady was struggling and it took them a long time to do anything about it. hopefully with the threat of relegation off their backs we might see a better performance against waterford next sunday. and on a side note was'nt the referee a disgrace.....

Rory hanniffy came into the game when he went into the halfback line maybe they should leave him there, as for del morkan had a great game again
he is becoming our tommy walsh, about two or three times in the second half he caught the ball over paudie mcnamara head who was way over del.

as for plain of the herb's maybe he got in late for the match, jame's o Brien didn't play for limerick he was the only change on the limerick team
from the programme, its hard to pick out hurler's now that they all wear helmet's.

[uibhfhailiabu]

Firstly, at least we have achieved our main aim and have preserved our Division 1 status. However, I feel yesterday's performance was very very poor with the exception of James Rigney, Dylan Hayden, Rory and Dooley and Del Morkan who I thought was fantastic. When Healion scored the 2nd goal (a superb pass from Molloy and the finsh from Ger), we should have kicked on there and killed the game off. The goals we conceded were very soft and I have to say defending was very questionable for all the goals. I think we were lucky the game ended when it did because if there had been another 3/4 mins, we probably would have been beaten by a poor Limerick team, and to be honest, a consistent Limerick free-taker and more accurate shooting from their midfielder and we would in fact have been beaten. On how many occasions did our forwards, especially Mahon and Currams, fail to rise the ball off the ground? Fair enough the surface didnt seem to be in the best condition but in all fairness, if we can't address basics of the game like rising the ball, it can't be good! At least we are now level on points with Kilkenny!!

On a final note, the refereeing by Michael Haverty yesterday was nothing short of a disgrace. For periods of the game, I wondered what Offaly would have to do to get the free! Although he seems to be consistent because any game we have him as the referee, he is terrible!!

Firstly well done to all, a second season of Division hurling can only do us good. When you look at Wexford, Leix, Carlow and Antrim battling it out to in all likelihood play Clare in a league final I am delighted that we will not be part of that scrap next season (mind you 1 up 1 down remains a disgrace and the HDC should hang their heads in shame on that one).

Just wondering what option do you favour? Do you favour a 2 up 2 down scenario?

[Plain of the Herbs]

My mistake. It was indeed McNamara (right half forward, number 10) who caught several balls over Morkan’s head in the first half. Well spotted FS. And there’s no need for others to offer lame excuses on my behalf.

plain of the herbs suggested he struggled with james obrien when in fact he marked paudie mc namara for most of the game and two other players during the game.