Allianz FL Division 4 2013

[kingscounty]

any word on Nial McNamee fit for sundays game, they might need him again the Shannonsiders

He is out for the game Sunday, quad injury. Huge loss, Limerick would be hard bet even if Niall was playing. Its a big ask for young Cunningham to play at full forward , he is one for the future but i feel with Niall not in there we will struggle to get and create scores.

[Truth as i see it]

any word on Nial McNamee fit for sundays game, they might need him again the Shannonsiders

He is out for the game Sunday, quad injury. Huge loss, Limerick would be hard bet even if Niall was playing. Its a big ask for young Cunningham to play at full forward , he is one for the future but i feel with Niall not in there we will struggle to get and create scores.

Have to disagree with that, i think its a good thing that other forwards are being asked to step up to the plate its important that the players learn to find a way around problems such as this, Nial wont always be available because of injury and its a dangerous thing to be over reliant on one single player, Opposition teams will always find us predictable and easy to deal with as an attacking threat unless we develop more options up to give them something to think about and division 4 is as good a place as any

[summerindublin]

Star forward Niall McNamee has been ruled out of Offaly's NFL Division 4 clash with Limerick on Sunday as he continues to struggle with a quad injury.

The Rhode clubman missed out on last weekend's opening round win away to London and has failed to prove his fitness ahead of this weekend's clash in Tullamore.

The starting 15 for the game against the Shannonsiders sees Peter Cunningham - who scored five points after being introduced as a 26th minute substitute in Ruislip - set for a full debut at full-forward while Richie Dalton is drafted into midfield.

Shane Sullivan and Bernard Allen make way in the changes.

Offaly (NFL v Limerick) - A Mulhall; B Darby, E Rigney, S Pender; D Hanlon, D Kelly, G Guilfoyle: A McNamee, R Dalton; R Brady, B Connor, E Carroll: M Mitchell, P Cunningham, A Sullivan.

[kingscounty]

any word on Nial McNamee fit for sundays game, they might need him again the Shannonsiders

He is out for the game Sunday, quad injury. Huge loss, Limerick would be hard bet even if Niall was playing. Its a big ask for young Cunningham to play at full forward , he is one for the future but i feel with Niall not in there we will struggle to get and create scores.

Have to disagree with that, i think its a good thing that other forwards are being asked to step up to the plate its important that the players learn to find a way around problems such as this, Nial wont always be available because of injury and its a dangerous thing to be over reliant on one single player, Opposition teams will always find us predictable and easy to deal with as an attacking threat unless we develop more options up to give them something to think about and division 4 is as good a place as any

I agree with you that players need to learn and adapt , but i rather see cunningham on the half forward line running at the defenders rather than standing static at full forward where high ball will most likely be launched in. Id rather see connor full forward winning high ball , but then again it depends on what way the lads play the ball into the forwards so maybe they have a plan to move the ball quick and not kick in high ball. Cunningham was outstanding when he came on last week scoring 5 points so lets hope he can do it again this week end. Divison 4 is not going to be easy to come out of and if we want to progress we need all our best players available, i couldnt see Offaly come out of divison 4 this year without a fit Niall mc , it may be predictable but time will tell.

[Ahlethimoutwithit]

If we can get a win on Sunday against Limerick without Niall, then we can really push on and get promotion. I think we have a break for 3 weeks after the Limerick game? Will be good break to get him back. Interesting to see B Allen dropped to the bench, Mitchell is getting every chance to prove himself?

[jimbob17]

This game sunday is massive, win and one of the favourites are behind us playing catch up, lose and we are playing catch up. Cunningham has done fantastically well when coming in since last year at 21 and deserves fully to start. Not sure if full forward is a natural position for him though as he is most effective when facing the goals an running at people.....To me the full forward line really has no natural inside player. Mitchell will play the withdrawn role and be in the attack only when we are going forward while Sullivan like Cunningham for me is at his best in half forward line, even if he is very good inside aswell. While Allen is left out, I cant really see who the other contenders are.

Expect Limerick to play similar game to Offaly with 13 behind the ball, it wont be pretty. They will have the edge in midfield as for me, Dalton and Alan Mc are not as mobile as the limerick middle will be. Alan Mc will pick up lots of breaking ball however around half back line and will start a lot of attacks for OY. Id expect Connor to be in the middle for a period. What has gone before (O Byrne cup etc) will count for very little on Sunday and hopefully we can nick it as I think we have the better footballers all round.

limerick forwards will take watching with some very dangerous players like Ian Ryan, Stephen Kelly, Seanie Buckley etc who are very strong and powerful runners while big Jim Donovan will be strong at Midfield..... They ran the legs off us in championship in Limerick 18 months ago but i think are lads will have closed the gap significantly in terms of fitness so it will be a battle of wits on the sideline and skill on the field of play....
Therefore, im fairly confident of an Offaly win and expect us to win with 2 or three points to spare....

[kingscounty]

Waterford 2-08 Tipp 0-09. Tipp bet again , Waterford are not going to be easy bet at home.

[DAF]

Limerick 0-12 Offaly 1-8

Pure sh1te.An absoultely terrible performance from Offaly with zero positives to take from the game it was just as bad if not worse than the terribel performances of the last few years.Again our half forward line is playing too deep and this encourages teams to attack us and very little pressure was put on limerick when they came forward in the last quarter of the match.We seem incapable of playing direct ball into the forwrd line, the lack of support the half forward line provides the full forward line leaves them totally isolated and thus the ball has to almost handed to our full forwards if we are not to lose possession.

Why was anton sullivan playing in the backs in the second half when he at leats has some dynamism to bring to the forward line?

Why do our players insist on cutting back rather than running forward with the ball?

Why dont they try Brian connor in the full forward line, it would gives us a target man and something to work off of?

[kingscounty]

This was the first big test this Offaly team faced and once again Limerick came out on top. I dont like been negative but I really cant see Offaly picking up much more wins in this group , we just dont have the fire power upfront.

[Ahlethimoutwithit]

This was desperate stuff! We were brutal in our ability to pick out forward passes, and 13 men behind the ball, but yet not marking was unreal.
However to take a small positive, we still should have won this game. Anton playing in front of the full back line actually worked well for the first 15 mins of the second half, as he cut off quite a bit of ball in. THE trouble started when the rest of the team decided to play in there also!
And also, what did Anton contribute in the first half, personally I think he should get a free role to play from the half forward line.

Key points:
1) We have no free taker, and none on the horizon
2) Why is Alan Mc being picked, and why is Shane Sullivan involved? A typical cameo from him.
3) The jersies caused major confusion in the first half! In cases like this, we should wear our change strip.
4) How many times did our guys hop the ball going into contact leading to turn overs
5) Richie Dalton is vital to us winning promotion, and developing as a team.

The positives are:
1) We will find out a little more about Emmet McDonnell as a manager after this, what will he learn, and what can the team take from this? In short, does he have a plan B?
2) THe players themselves, they bottled this game, and they should know it, they need to learn, as well as the coach
We must try and be more attacking, Ross Brady, Brian Connor were quite good
3) Conditions were shite, Limerick physically bossed us, hopefully conditions will get better and as a result our forwards will perform better.
4) we dont play again for 2 weeks, and Clare come to town. Micko arriving also should ensure that the crowd are up for this one, hopefully the same can be said for the players. Will give a chance to really see if we are going to improve, and learn from mistakes.
5) Great crowd, up to us to keep the faith!

[jimbob17]

Couldnt make the game today so cant comment too much.....Knew itd be tight and that Limerick are one of the teams to beat. While there is some negative comment, i wouldn t be so hard. This is very much an inexperienced team and yet, we lost by a point which is not bad. If this was last year we would be saying there are a lot of positives and i still think there are. Tipp beaten again and waterford won so teams will take points from each other so still a great chance of qualifying.....

Niall missing and lack of inside players is an issue but We were a hell of a lot closer to them than in Limerick in the qualifiers 18 months ago so i'd go easy on McDonnell and the lads just yet as the last thing these fellas need is keyboard warriors having a go when they are doing their level best and really training hard.....We could be in this division for a year or 2 yet..and if we are, i dont think it is necessarily the worst thing in the world once the proper structures are put in place and clear progression and improvements continue.......

[DAF]

Couldnt make the game today so cant comment too much.....Knew itd be tight and that Limerick are one of the teams to beat. While there is some negative comment, i wouldn t be so hard. This is very much an inexperienced team and yet, we lost by a point which is not bad. If this was last year we would be saying there are a lot of positives and i still think there are. Tipp beaten again and waterford won so teams will take points from each other so still a great chance of qualifying.....

Niall missing and lack of inside players is an issue but We were a hell of a lot closer to them than in Limerick in the qualifiers 18 months ago so i'd go easy on McDonnell and the lads just yet as the last thing these fellas need is keyboard warriors having a go when they are doing their level best and really training hard.....We could be in this division for a year or 2 yet..and if we are, i dont think it is necessarily the worst thing in the world once the proper structures are put in place and clear progression and improvements continue.......

Niall McNamee was playng today

[Truth as i see it]

Limerick 0-12 Offaly 1-8

Pure sh1te.An absoultely terrible performance from Offaly with zero positives to take from the game it was just as bad if not worse than the terribel performances of the last few years.Again our half forward line is playing too deep and this encourages teams to attack us and very little pressure was put on limerick when they came forward in the last quarter of the match.We seem incapable of playing direct ball into the forwrd line, the lack of support the half forward line provides the full forward line leaves them totally isolated and thus the ball has to almost handed to our full forwards if we are not to lose possession.

Why was anton sullivan playing in the backs in the second half when he at leats has some dynamism to bring to the forward line?

Why do our players insist on cutting back rather than running forward with the ball?

Why dont they try Brian connor in the full forward line, it would gives us a target man and something to work off of?

I wasn't at the game either but i think people need to take stock of where we are now compared to this time last year.

We would have been well beaten by a team of Limericks ability 12 months ago and at least this time we were competitive

We need to take this one step at a time and realize without making excuses that the young players are learning their trade and with so little senior experience on the team there will be days when things don't go to plan

Don't forget there was that Sean Pender chance at the end that could have won the game

Its going to take at least a year for Mcdonnells game plan to fully compute with the players and certain building blocks have to be put in place for that to happen

Step 1 was getting the confidence up and to a certain degree he has done that

Step 2 will be getting the strength and conditioning aspect up and that will take at least a year

As Vinney Claffey said on Midlands it was Limericks ability to take scores today and their strength and nohow that got them their win today

Don't forget too that Mcdonnell is new to this level of football as well and he will make mistakes along the way but the most important this is that he learns from them

The only thing i don't like is the overly defensive stance he has the team playing at the moment but judging by the way he had St Marys playing last year my guess is he is using it as a default style to start off with and develop a more attacking style as the younger players progress

People have to be patient with this team and not start throwing a strop at the first sign of problems

We are on the right track, we are fitter and more competitive than we have been for a long time, but there's still a lot of development to come from both this team and manager before we can start scaling the heights

Right now is about learning from mistakes and laying the foundations

People should remember that

[DAF]

Limerick 0-12 Offaly 1-8

Pure sh1te.An absoultely terrible performance from Offaly with zero positives to take from the game it was just as bad if not worse than the terribel performances of the last few years.Again our half forward line is playing too deep and this encourages teams to attack us and very little pressure was put on limerick when they came forward in the last quarter of the match.We seem incapable of playing direct ball into the forwrd line, the lack of support the half forward line provides the full forward line leaves them totally isolated and thus the ball has to almost handed to our full forwards if we are not to lose possession.

Why was anton sullivan playing in the backs in the second half when he at leats has some dynamism to bring to the forward line?

Why do our players insist on cutting back rather than running forward with the ball?

Why dont they try Brian connor in the full forward line, it would gives us a target man and something to work off of?

I wasn't at the game either but i think people need to take stock of where we are now compared to this time last year.

We would have been well beaten by a team of Limericks ability 12 months ago and at least this time we were competitive

We need to take this one step at a time and realize without making excuses that the young players are learning their trade and with so little senior experience on the team there will be days when things don't go to plan

Don't forget there was that Sean Pender chance at the end that could have won the game

Its going to take at least a year for Mcdonnells game plan to fully compute with the players and certain building blocks have to be put in place for that to happen

Step 1 was getting the confidence up and to a certain degree he has done that

Step 2 will be getting the strength and conditioning aspect up and that will take at least a year

As Vinney Claffey said on Midlands it was Limericks ability to take scores today and their strength and nohow that got them their win today

Don't forget too that Mcdonnell is new to this level of football as well and he will make mistakes along the way but the most important this is that he learns from them

The only thing i don't like is the overly defensive stance he has the team playing at the moment but judging by the way he had St Marys playing last year my guess is he is using it as a default style to start off with and develop a more attacking style as the younger players progress

People have to be patient with this team and not start throwing a strop at the first sign of problems

We are on the right track, we are fitter and more competitive than we have been for a long time, but there's still a lot of development to come from both this team and manager before we can start scaling the heights

Right now is about learning from mistakes and laying the foundations

People should remember that

I'm not throwing a strop but the performance today was terrible and was just as bad as the rubbish of last year and some lessons are not being learned.Despite having one of the best ball winning corner forwards in ireland we refuse to play a little more direct when Offaly have been more direct in the last few years it has worked fairly well the match against Westmeath in the league 2011 being a good example, the goal today was from direct football.The team are a good deal better and more organised than last year and have made progress, my biggest issue with today is that all the bad habits from the past returned and that despite the need to be tighter defensively we are dropping far too deep and inviting teams on to us.We are in the bottom division and regardless of how bad we are we shouldnt be so negative and fearful going forward.The positioning of the half forward line deep makes sense agianst division 1 and division 2 oppisition like Laois and Kildare however it is counter productive in games like today which are there for the taking if we are just a little more positive.

[Ahlethimoutwithit]

I am not being overly critical either here. And DAF is right, this was as bad as anything we have seen over recent years.
We should have won this game, but all the bad habits of recent years were there in abundance. My only wish is that the lads will learn from this, and most importantly, to see what the manager changes.
Also from this game, I would be surprised if we won more than 30% of the kick outs and ensuing breaking ball.

The other point someone makes here is that we were closer than in the championship a couple of years ago, remember we kicked a shocking amount of wides that day, and were pushing hard at 1 pt down, when a turnover cost us a goal, and Limerick ended up winning by 5pts. But we kicked terrible wides.

I will be interested to see how we adapt after this. I dont want anyone to tell me Shane Sullivan has anything to offer to the progression of Offaly football, again fairplay to the lad for answering the call up, but he should have been red carded and eventually was taken off.

Ref was a joke overall too btw.