Offaly v Kildare, Senior football qualifier, 4th July

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Exiled in Connacht
County player
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Re: Offaly v Kildare, Senior football qualifier, 4th July

Post by Exiled in Connacht »

The loss to Longford was hard to take after the great league final win but perhaps there is a bit of light emerging under Pat Flanagan.

Consolidating our position in division 3 next year is of vital importance. We will be in with Kildare and Westmeath (both down from div 2), Tipp, Sligo, Clare, Limerick and of course Longford. Nothing easy there but if we can target our home games and make it tough for teams to win in Tullamore there is hope.

Making progress in the league and continuing with a further year of progress on the strength and development side is in the long term of greater importance than winning a game in Leinster next year.

Anyway we live in hope :D

atomic
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Re: Offaly v Kildare, Senior football qualifier, 4th July

Post by atomic »

Mulhall free in the first half when 6-4 up was a big turning point, heads dropped after ad we didn't score again in the first half. On he frees we never seem to have a quality long range free taker, there were several occasions where we won a free 45/50 metres out and played it short, can't help thinking if we had a free taker with a long range and a lot of consistancy we'd be be better off by 5-6 points every game. Couple of frees in the first half I though Alan Mulhall could have had a go at, I've also seen Paul mc with a long range kick from his days a =s an Offaly minor goalkeeper.

Serious improvement this year, well done to the lads. Hopefully target some winnable division games and not go straight back down again. Longfort clare well beatable

dubbiff
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Re: Offaly v Kildare, Senior football qualifier, 4th July

Post by dubbiff »

Just wondering if anyone else thinks that high tackles are endemic now in Gaelic football? Last night I thought that Kildare were guilty of a huge number of this type of foul. Also today there were loads of them in the Munster final and watching highlights on the Sunday game I saw examples in other games as well. Most were not dangerous but look terrible. A GAA version of the choke tackle?

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Bord na Mona man
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Re: Offaly v Kildare, Senior football qualifier, 4th July

Post by Bord na Mona man »

A lot of positives for Offaly on Saturday. On a couple of occasions when you suspected Kildare were going to pull away, Offaly came storming back. In other years this might not have been the case. The effort didn't wilt and the players showed a bit of adventure in their play throughout

In the end Offaly weren’t streetwise enough to close the deal and while we were close at times, I didn’t believe a shock was a realistic possibility. The players will be disappointed with some of the poor decisions in possession and certain turnovers where the ball was softly spilled out of the Offaly player’s hand, when a bit more strength would have seen them running into space.

A key difference between the sides was that Kildare could play long balls to the full forward line and had ball winners like Alan Smith to win the duels. Offaly had to either carry it in, or play it low into the corners. Niall McNamee wasn’t in great shape and had to resort to one handed pick ups and catches and was easily knocked off it. In retrospect, it wasn’t the day for him to play and also I’m sure the management might regret whipping off Nigel Dunne a couple of minutes before they realised Niall was goosed.

Offaly optimism should be tempered a little with the reality that Kildare are no great shakes and hit a stack of wides. Their tackling was bad - at least a dozen above the shoulder drag backs on runners that could have led to more black cards (the one on TSG highlights in the build-up to Offaly’s goal being a text book example). They continually overcarried despite the ref continually blowing for it and committed bovine fouls like blatant shoves in the back. People might cite the 6 day turnaround, but those are the hallmarks of a team not going particularly well.

Offaly have improved by a decent measure in 2015 and have opened the door to improving a bit more in 2016.

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