Coláiste Choilm

A forum to air your views on Offaly GAA matters and beyond.
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Lone Shark
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Club: Ferbane
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Re: Coláiste Choilm

Post by Lone Shark »

jimbob17 wrote:Correct me if I am wrong but Are we getting a little carried away with this col choilm success?

While it's fantastic and well done to all concerned, the fact is that they should be strongest hurling school in County given feeder clubs.

Bal Durrow won last two minors and na fianna won before that. They also take from Tullamore who are strong at u16 and some from shamrocks and Clara in an all boys school. Maybe I am wrong but have they not under performed for donkeys years, primarily in football as an all boys school of around 600 boys?

While they have done great this year and it is to be welcomed, it should be no surprise. As the strong hurling school in County now, should they not be looking to play A grade. Teams they beat along the way have been up at A level the last few years with much smaller school population. Portumna been one case in point and they'd also be mixed school. COL Eoin were also up there until recently.

Gallen have won consistently in B football over last number of years and never got the same type of acclaim but have done it consistently to degree that they should also be in A in football.

We should be pushing schools to compete at levels which they're capable. Westmeath have 4 or 5 schools regularly compete at A level in football. Marist, Moate, Rochfortbridge and sometimes a Mullingar school or athlone community college.

This is where we fall down in Offaly. We need to have the schools act as almost a mini centre of excellence if we are to get up and running again.
Comparing Gallen and Coláiste Choilm doesn't really make sense in that in terms of size, they are in different worlds. CC would have around 3.5 boys enrolled for every 1 that's in Gallen, and while the Ferbane lads would hold their own at "A" level every so often, they're dependent on a good vintage coming along. It's entirely possible that they'll have to drop down to "C" level in the next couple of years now because they just don't have exceptional groups coming up along the line, and that's not a reflection on anyone in the school, it just proves that you can't outwit demographics forever.

Coláiste Choilm is a very different case and yes, they should be competing at a much higher level, particularly in football. I take the point that right now, they have some exceptional hurlers, but it's very early to say that this is going to continue to be the case. Hopefully it will - but what we can say is that there will almost never be a time when they don't have some good footballers to choose from. Even when the Tullamores and Claras of this world go through a few lean years, you'll still be able to pull from Durrow, Shamrocks, the Daingean parish clubs, and some of the lads from Na Fianna as well. If you can't make a competitive group out of that, that's deeply worrying from an Offaly point of view.

Just on the Westmeath side, I would throw in an addendum there. Coláiste Mhuire are in a great place right now and you can't argue with a Junior "A" All Ireland win, but the three Athlone schools draw very heavily on the Roscommon clubs. Marist are 50/50, ACC closer to 67/33 and Coláiste Chiaráin (formerly Aloysius) 80/20 Roscommon. It's a bit like Edenderry in Offaly - we all want to see them do well, but it probably means as much if not more to Kildare football as it does to Offaly. So it is with the Athlone sides.
Kevin Egan. Signed out of respect for players and all involved with Offaly.

Plain of the Herbs
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Re: Coláiste Choilm

Post by Plain of the Herbs »

Only getting around to this now. A belated 'well done' to Coláiste Choilm. By the sounds of it, they faced a test of their character on Saturday, and they passed that test. Not for the first time this year, either, as they were under pressure against Coláiste Eóin and against Portumna too.

The significance of an Offaly team beating an Ulster one cannot be underestimated. And I was concerned when I read a player’s quote in a media interview relating their mantra as – don’t make this into a battle of skills, make this into a battle of wills. So Tullamore’s win is even more impressive.

There is an opinion that the fitter team should beat a hurling team in the event of extra time. But this isn’t necessarily so. It seems to me that fit teams are fit to last 60 (or 70) minutes, whatever is required, but are burned out in extra time. Whereas a hurling team who prefer to stand up and move the ball on are still able to do this in extra time as they aren’t as dependent on heavy legs. Item: Birr v Clarecastle in 1998.

The Thurles thing was surely a distraction to Tullamore too. Traditional Offaly teams ave a terrible record there and would baulk at going to Thurles. The post Primary Schools football finals are played in Croke Park, while the schools hurling finalists have to make do with Thurles. Now that’s unfair.
Pat Donegan. Signed out of respect for players and all involved with Offaly.

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