Offaly Senior Hurlers 2023

[private joker]

Very good win. Offaly very strong all over. Will have to get use to the "rough stuff". It's worse at liam mcarthy level.

[faithfulfanatic]

Agree with a lot of what’s posted above, Offaly very impressive despite playing into Kerry’s hand for a lot of the early stages.
Kerry had no game plan to actually try and win the game, their only plan was to move Mackessy out to half back from his sweeper role. He is a great hurler and very athletic, wasted where he was. I thought Shane Conway was almost invisible, gone back a lot in the last year or two. It seemed some of the Kerry lads were only there to antagonise Offaly lads, anytime no.10 that was on Eoghan Cahill actually got the ball he didn’t look like he was able to hit it and always looked for a handpass.
Cleary, Burke, King all outstanding.
Jack Clancy has cemented a starting spot when many of us would never have considered him before this year, gets through a mountain of work and has pace to burn.
Killian Sampson looked off it today and a bit leggy.
Cillian Kiely also looked off it a tad but his physical presence alone warrants a place on his bad days. Hope he’s ok after that horrible hit from Boyle.
Delaney must’ve been carrying a knock as he went off early when hurling well.
Nally had a great first half but anonymous in the second half.
Duignan got a few crucial scores when needed.
Dara Maher is a great distributor of the ball, gave in some lovely low diagonal balls to the corners, Burke and Corcoran both guilty of electing to balloon the ball in, which is never going to be of use to Nally, Mitchell, Cahill etc.
Although I would worry about Maher when a better team pushes up on Offaly.
I would also worry about the make up of our subs, only 2 out and out backs on the subs in James Nally and Sam Bourke, who have less than half an hour of inter county championship experience between them.
Eimhin Kelly and Joey Keenaghan showed well on introduction.
Hopefully Paddy Clancy and Screeney are back available soon, both should have a role to play before this campaign is out.
Ref was worst I’ve seen in a very long time.
I see a comment above saying get used to the hitting as it’s worse at the tier 1 level, but it was more so that the minimal hits from offaly were giving as frees for Kerry today. That standard of refereeing isn’t good enough for anywhere. Colm Lyons doing linesman on the terrace side in the second half was even visibly dissatisfied with some decisions. If the challenge on Kiely had happened in a Munster championship game, there would be a Prime time episode and a 3 part documentary made about it.
Kerry gone back an awful lot from where they were in the past few years, almost laughable how they continued to let Offaly have the short puck outs and aim balls to the 2 corner forwards when 7,8,9,10 points down. At this stage they had the midfield packed with bodies, when anyone could see the ball would not be going in there.

I think Offaly need to strike a balance for next weeks game.
On a great winning streak which nobody wants to see lose.
Also some sore bodies which need rest.
And others which need minutes.
But make too many changes and suddenly you upset the flow of things and there’s a witch hunt for Offaly not trying.
5-6 changes with lads coming in who have a realistic chance of playing a part in the final. Give Kiely, Mitchell (due to u20 duties) and 3-4 more carrying niggles a rest.
Antrim and Laois have both done it on occasion to Offaly in the recent past, whether it be Antrim sending down a panel of 17 to tullamore for a final round league game before beating us in the relegation playoff a week after or Laois fielding weakened team in final game against other opposition which cost us.
I’d like to think our lads would like to keep the wheel rolling, albeit in a sensible manner which strikes the fine line between giving a lads a rest and giving it a crack.

Offaly have no reason to fear anyone left in this competition and as they have done to this stage so far, keep letting our superior hurling do the talking.
Hon the faithful!

[Toxicity234]

Good Result.

https://twitter.com/mlverney/status/165 ... 64032?s=20
That was the hit on Kiely.
I think it a red.

Carlow next.
A few years ago, I would be saying it unfair to field a understrength team.
Now. i watch other team do it.
So. Protect out players and give the panel a run.

Of Carlow, Kerry or Laois which one would you want to play in the Final?.

[Kevin]

Bad foul with intent.

[JimBwobb]

Of Carlow, Kerry or Laois which one would you want to play in the Final?.

Kerry, as we have their measure now and know we are the better hurlers and will do our hurling on the field, instead of the shite tactics they came to Tullamore with yesterday.

I think Laois may pip us if we meet again, although they are not going well.

Carlow have a few decent physical forwards which may be the difference, but again I think we have the better hurlers across the field.

[Lone Shark]

I absolutely wouldn't look at it from the point of view of "who do we want to play in the final". If ever there was a logic that was destined to end in painful, ironic defeat, that's it.

Now don't get me wrong, if we do field an understrength team in Carlow next weekend, that accusation will be thrown at us, particularly from the far side of the Slieve Blooms, but I wouldn't pay any heed. This has been a ludicrously busy run, with seven league games and four championship games played in the space of four months. Lads need rest, and it's only right to give it to them, and that is the single reason why resting players is important.

Look at it on a player by player basis. Cillian Kiely took a hard hit to the head, and an extra week would do him no harm for that reason alone. I'm surprised Charlie Mitchell is still going with all the games he's played in 2023, and he has another huge one on Wednesday night. 100%, he should not play on Saturday. Eoghan Cahill had Kyle O'Connor trying everything in the book to stop him last week, and I'd say he's sporting a few colourful bruises today too. He's rock solid and dependable, but we need him fresh and firing, and we also need someone else to be ready to step in in case he gets injured in the final.

Add in a few other knocks and bumps, and suddenly you have half a dozen players not starting, all with very good justification, which has nothing to do with "who do we want to play in the final".

[llkj]

I took a screenshot of the moment of impact of the Keily collision . Both players are head on and there is no evidence of the Kerry player leading with a shoulder/elbow/head to the offaly players head.
The more I look at it, the more I think it was a mutual collision without any malicious intend on either side… but maybe I am wrong.

DB6C187F-4B85-4E8F-9316-3B8ED948B38F.png (2.21 MiB) Viewed 10226 times

[G91]

I took a screenshot of the moment of impact of the Keily collision . Both players are head on and there is no evidence of the Kerry player leading with a shoulder/elbow/head to the offaly players head.
The more I look at it, the more I think it was a mutual collision without any malicious intend on either side… but maybe I am wrong.

DB6C187F-4B85-4E8F-9316-3B8ED948B38F.png

There was serious intent behind it you can tell me it was fair kiley was focused on the ball and the kerry play waited for his moment it wasn't as if he was running out to block him down he stood his ground and leveled him with no intention of winning the ball , if he wasn't at it like the rest off the kerry team you would give him the benefit but the hole game was played with kerry trying to get offaly players of the field

[Anonymous1]

Good Result.

https://twitter.com/mlverney/status/165 ... 64032?s=20
That was the hit on Kiely.
I think it a red.

Carlow next.
A few years ago, I would be saying it unfair to field a understrength team.
Now. i watch other team do it.
So. Protect out players and give the panel a run.

Of Carlow, Kerry or Laois which one would you want to play in the Final?.

In order of preference:
1. Kerry
2. Carlow
3. Laois

I think it's fairly clear cut what we should do, give any lads who want or need a rest the full game off and give some panel members who've not had many minutes all year a run. If we still win the game, great but if we don't, also great. If we set out to lose on purpose and then Kerry beat Laois, we'd be fuming with ourselves so just let the chips fall where they may.

[ah lethimoutwithit]

I'm caught on this one like Lone Shark.

All manner of teams have abused these situations in the past in my eyes for there are 5 games in the group and we have gone about our business well in these so far.
The way I look at it, management have earned the right through a ludicrous run of games to treat this game as they see best optimises their chances of winning the Joe Mc. Every game has been a final in its own right and we have had a fair share of injuries to deal with.
They know their players and the opposition better than I do so best of luck with what team should be picked for next weekend.

On the Kiely situation, I saw him run into the Kerry man straight on, there is an onus on the attacking player to sidestep or change the angle of running, its not rugby lads. From where I sat Kiely ran straight, similarly,Paddy Delaney was coming out of the backs with a ball and accelerated into the Kerryman also in the second half and imo the ref penalised the Offaly man rightly in that instance.

I hope Kiely is ok as he is the type of player that could take the final by the scruff of the neck and is a key player for us.

Was disgusted to see Cahill and the Number 10 for Kerry getting yellows, what are linesmen in particular scanning around the pitch? Disappointing to see players not being protected but as someone has said there is worse happening at Liam Mc level.

[G91]

Look at dublins 8 point yesterday, dublin player on the run nobody came out to meet him with a shoulder to the head , you can't just strip all responsibility from a backsman that he can tackle front on like that just because the attacking player hasn't made an effort to sidestep, the kerry back didn't make an effort to win the ball he went straight out to knock Kiely off his feet , its the old scenario where you get by one then 2 defenders and the next lad is going to make sure you don't get by him, this was not a kerry player running side by side or even coming out to win it he waited for his opportunity


Aside from that debacle since the under 20 is supposed to be fixed for Wednesday does that mean the joe mcdonagh final will be a standalone fixture or played alongside the christy ring, lorry meagher ,nicky rackerd

[G91]

Any team news for tomorrow, presumably cahill, Mitchell ,Kiely won't start

[Lone Shark]

Questions answered.

OFFALY: Eamonn Cleary; Conor Hardiman, Ben Conneely, James Nally; Dara Maher, Killian Sampson, Eoghan Parlon; Paddy Delaney, Jack Screeney; Liam Langton, Joey Keenaghan, Conor Langton; Cathal O'Meara, Shane Dooley, John Murphy.

Subs: Stephen Corcoran, Paddy Clancy, Eimhin Kelly, David King, David Nally, Jack Clancy, Jason Sampson, Ciaran Burke, Brian Duignan, Sam Bourke, Joe Hoctor

[JimBwobb]

Good to see the squad getting a run out and lads playing a championship game after all their training all year.

Overall I think we are very light in terms of numbers in the backs so would be lovely to see strenght in depth next season.

Let's finish this season on a high !!!!

[frankthetank]

Sam Bourke and Joe Hoctor are literally making up the numbers there! I wouldn’t even them doing the warm up to be honest. They’ve enough going on.