National Hurling League 2017

A forum to air your views on Offaly GAA matters and beyond.
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ditchhurler
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Re: National Hurling League 2017

Post by ditchhurler »

Dublin v Waterford Waterford by 5
Kilkenny v Cork. Kilkenny by 2
Tipperary v Clare Tipperary by 6

1B
Limerick v Offaly Limerick by 12
Galway V Laois Galway by 9
Wexford v Kerry Wexford by 18

Plain of the Herbs
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A few things for Offaly to improve on . . .

Post by Plain of the Herbs »

A few things I’d like to see an improvement in tomorrow evening in Limerick –

That Offaly do better on their own puckouts. Not necessarily that they’d win them all, rather that they’d at least contest them all;

That Offaly don’t give away possession by swiping the ball to somewhere and someone they can’t see;

That Offaly would hurl with a bit of intensity;

That Offaly would, at least occasionally, run at Limerick and see what might happen. Maybe they’d create an overlap and create a goal chance. Maybe they’d be fouled and win a scoreable free. All the same where the points come from, a score from a free is worth the same as a score from play;

That Seán Ryan would get a bit of help;

That Offaly’s tackling be more effective, and above all that they would finish with fifteen on the field.
Pat Donegan. Signed out of respect for players and all involved with Offaly.

allstar2010
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Re: National Hurling League 2017

Post by allstar2010 »

Agree with PotH, big improvement needed in a few areas like winning own puckout, better discipline and work rate. Result is not important (although a win would be great) I feel the big thing is that management and players are moving in the right direction. No real pressure on, so just go have a go and see what happens. Great to see a bit of experience like Morkan and Quirke return to the fold! Best of luck.

sam88885a
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Re: A few things for Offaly to improve on . . .

Post by sam88885a »

Plain of the Herbs wrote:A few things I’d like to see an improvement in tomorrow evening in Limerick –

That Offaly do better on their own puckouts. Not necessarily that they’d win them all, rather that they’d at least contest them all;

That Offaly don’t give away possession by swiping the ball to somewhere and someone they can’t see;

That Offaly would hurl with a bit of intensity;

That Offaly would, at least occasionally, run at Limerick and see what might happen. Maybe they’d create an overlap and create a goal chance. Maybe they’d be fouled and win a scoreable free. All the same where the points come from, a score from a free is worth the same as a score from play;

That Seán Ryan would get a bit of help;

That Offaly’s tackling be more effective, and above all that they would finish with fifteen on the field.
Poth i agree we need to do better on our own puckouts but J Dempsey just can find an offaly man, he will either be 10 yards too short or 10 yards too long .He is a super shot stopper but he is a huge weakness on our puckouts .Equally S Dooley is a great finisher but he cannot hook or tackle effectively and the defensive side of his game is poor , he is no Colin Fennelly so we need to give him good ball and he will do damage but without good supply he is only a spectator.
I agree Sean Ryan need everyone else to copy his intensity but he also needs to look up when he is in position .he could let the ball go earlier and he is guilty of trying to do too much and giving away position at times.
All 3 are leaders on this team of young lads so we need them to be as good as the can be .Everyone need to improve including those 3 ,if we are to compete with Limerick .I dont think our half back line or or half forward line has enough ball winners to compete with any of the top teams .

kingscounty
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Re: National Hurling League 2017

Post by kingscounty »

Lost by a point in Limerick, great effort lads. Dooley with two goals Kelly with the other. Limerick had 14 men for second half , unlucky in the end huge improvement and can only build a bit of confidence from it.

kingscounty
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Re: National Hurling League 2017

Post by kingscounty »

Correction 3-15 to 1-25 soz

shannonbanks14
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Re: National Hurling League 2017

Post by shannonbanks14 »

Do your sums kingscounty a 4pt loss. Just home from Limerick; did ok first half. 1-13 ta 2-3 second haf score n they with 14. 9 scores more and they missin lot of starters. To dependent on dooley, who was on form fair play to him tonight.

kingscounty
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Re: National Hurling League 2017

Post by kingscounty »

shannonbanks14 wrote:Do your sums kingscounty a 4pt loss. Just home from Limerick; did ok first half. 1-13 ta 2-3 second haf score n they with 14. 9 scores more and they missin lot of starters. To dependent on dooley, who was on form fair play to him tonight.
No shit Sherlock

Dontnukejapan
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Re: National Hurling League 2017

Post by Dontnukejapan »

Lads living in the UK these times does anyone know of anywhere you can the highlights of the Offaly game?

Thanks

Toxicity234
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Re: National Hurling League 2017

Post by Toxicity234 »

Been Impressed by Kevin Ryan over the last few weeks.
Galway was a mess but Laois we were better and again he learned from the Laois game.
I'm not looking for perfection but improvement when it come to management and Over the last few week we seen that and that good.
And his interview after was good as well, really disappointing with the result.

His team is better set up than again. Conor Doughlan is to good a hurler to be tie up at full back.
Half forwards line is an issue. P Geraghty and P Murphy are the only natural half forward we have and Geraghty is still find his feet at this level.
Kiely is still carrying an injury and doesn't have the legs for half forward at the moment.
The like of Shane Kinsella, Colin Egan, Conor Mahon, Ronan Hughes and Colm Mulronney would all be more natural half forwards and honestly at least two on them are need.
All that said When you add back in Bergin, Morkan, Gardiner, Tracey, P Murphy Quirke fighting for positions. We could well be build something good.
It's also important to keep the likes of E Gorgan,D Maloney, A Cleary and L Langton in the squad as they could have big futures ahead of them at inter county level.

The Wexford game is a big one. We be looking for a improvement again. At home we should be looking to push Wexford all the way.
“Common sense is not so common.”

sam88885a
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Re: National Hurling League 2017

Post by sam88885a »

Tox i have to agree Kevin Ryan deserves credit for offaly improving each game after the Galway hammering and with C Egan S Kinsella j Bergin to come back and both S Gardner and A Tracy push for the starting 15 again .
Kevin Ryan should have a decent pick by the time we play Kerry which is a must win game for us .
Things are moving in the right direction and we still could make a quarter finalwith 2 game left.

kaiserchief
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Re: National Hurling League 2017

Post by kaiserchief »

we will see will both of ye change your tune after Wexford game this weekend.

After the Limerick result and performance everyone has an expectation of the same for the Wexford game now but also the possibility of a good beating on home soil.

Plain of the Herbs
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Offaly v Wexford, OCP, Sunday 12th March

Post by Plain of the Herbs »

Wexford next. It doesn’t get any easier. It is a concern for Offaly that next Sunday’s opposition turned over at half-time last Sunday level with Kerry. Now, granted the wind was a significant factor and Wexford cantered to a second-half win, but they will be anxious to run up a tally in next Sunday’s first half.

There were positives from Saturday’s display, which didn’t seem likely when Limerick were reeling off the scores during the settling-in period, the period when most club matches in Offaly see the first six points shared equally, regardless of how one-sided the match might become. Offaly did much better on Limerick’s puckout, just it took so long to get over Limerick’s end line for the first time.

Oisín Kelly is a useful target man. Right half-forward is probably his optimum position, for the moment anyway, where he had fetch the Dempsey puckout, turn infield onto his left and run hard at the opposition.

Good to see Stephen Quirke back in the fold. He can be a useful 13 over the next three matches, and will likely have established himself by then. I wonder would Cillian Kiely have a role in the centre of the defence. Particularly if Conor Doughan is to continue at midfield. And Doughan offers a scoring capability from range. Then again, Wexford could operate with seven defenders and five forwards, in which case you’d want Conor Doughan doing the sweeping.

Here’s a thought: if Limerick hadn’t had a man sent off when they did, would Offaly have played a seventh defender in the second half? And would they have done it right?

A few things still bother me. In no particular order.

The defending – Offaly simply can’t cope with runners breaking away into space. They aren’t alert to opposition player making a run, and too often in Saturday’s first half a Limerick player made an untracked run into the space between the half-back and full-back line. There seems to be a communication issue here. Does nobody give a lad a shout? Jim Troy would growl at a defender, back in the day.

Tackling. Offaly picked up six yellow cards on Saturday. Other than Derek Morkan’s frontal charge (which on another day might have been a red, particularly with Limerick already down to 14 and referees like to even up the numbers), most of the remainder were for that stupid ‘Offaly tackle’ of flailing with on hand on the hurl. Referees dislike it, they are going to blow for the fre and they are going to wave a yellow card, and there is no use whining at the referee for not letting the game flow. It needs to be stamped out. And while Offaly did finish with 15 men, with Limerick having a monopoly of possession, you couldn’t say the discipline issue has been solved.

Physicality – it’s not an issue that anything can be done about regarding the current Senior team, but the inability to burst through a tackle out from defence to effect a clearance is a major handicap. All the moreso in heavy going in a Limerick quagmire which rendered the evasion of tackles extremely difficult.

As for the forwards, Offaly made merely a dozen attempts at a score inside the Limerick 45 metre line, and four starting forwards managed four attempts at a score between them. All four were on the field for at least 50 minutes. And that’s playing with a stiff wind for 35 minutes.

You just wish an Offaly forward would make a darting run across the attacking 21 and that he would be found with a diagonal delivery from distance. Everyone else can do it. Offaly inside forwards, in contrast, tend to make runs outfield, staying on their own side. Hope springs eternal.

Elsewhere at the weekend, I expect Limerick will run up a significant tally against Leix after last Saturday’s fright while Galway will keep up their scoring run against Kerry. If Offaly can get stuck in, scoring difference could turn the relegation scenario on its head over the weekend. They need to get stuck in though, and in Offaly, like the financial markets, past performance is no guarantee of future performance.
Pat Donegan. Signed out of respect for players and all involved with Offaly.

Plain of the Herbs
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Re: National Hurling League 2017

Post by Plain of the Herbs »

Looking at the fixture schedule, there is a strong likelihood of a O'Connor Park double-header when the footballers play Leix and the hurlers have their NHL quarter-final (or the relegation playoff). Both are fixed for the same weekend.
Pat Donegan. Signed out of respect for players and all involved with Offaly.

Plain of the Herbs
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Re: National Hurling League 2017

Post by Plain of the Herbs »

The Wexicans have announced their panel of 26. On a rough count there are 19 different clubs represented. And being a Davy Fitxgerald managed team, at least two wearing numbers >15 will start.
http://www.wexfordgaa.ie/2017/03/wexfor ... ng-league/
Pat Donegan. Signed out of respect for players and all involved with Offaly.

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