Offaly v Kildare Leinster SFC 1/4 Final 2021

A forum to air your views on Offaly GAA matters and beyond.
jimbob17
All Star
Posts: 910
Joined: Wed Apr 25, 2007 12:40 am

Re: Offaly v Kildare Leinster SFC 1/4 Final 2021

Post by jimbob17 »

summerindublin wrote: Mon Jul 05, 2021 11:15 am Unfortunately Offaly leart nothing from the previous games, kick outs were a shambles again, Rigney was a hugh loss, I would say that we might have won if he had not got injured, forward line in general was poor, wrong options taken and finally ref was poor for Offaly
I think we are lauding this team more than we should be. Yes we got promotion, yes we were competitive V Kildare and stepping stones etc and all that. However I think we should have been finishing top of our group of 4. Tipp were short 8 or 9 of last years team. That said, Fermanagh was a good win. Derry a poor loss.

We have good experienced players and some right good young players coming too. However, we have been quite competitive at minor and u20/21 for last 7 or 8 years now and should be expecting to be very competitive with Kildare at senior. I was expecting to be a bit more competitive yesterday to be honest. We were for first half yesterday but should have led at HT. Second half was a disaster. Flynn's goal was terrible to give away. He walked through from the 45 all the way without anyone laying a hand on him. If they were not reduced to 13, would we be so positive. Lets be honest, We were destroyed in the second half yesterday.

Sometimes I struggle to figure out the type of game we are playing. Is it a hand-passing game or a kicking game? We have good forwards but we really struggle to create scoring chances. I think our forward play is very static and slow and it wouldn't take a lot to improve this. P Cunningham is a massive talent but I just feel he is not getting most from himself. On his day, he is as good as what is in the country I believe but for some reason, it just isn't firing for him recently. I think him at midfield is not working and he needs to be closer to goal - maybe centre or wing forward where he has less tracking back to do and more freedom to be positive. I can't figure out either how Johnny Maloney and Karl Stewart can be in same team together. Both are very similar - strong powerful centre backs but I think neither are suited to wing back midfield roles. In fact I would have liked to see Moloney thrown in full forward for last 10 mins when we clearly needed a goal at end yesterday. He has done it very effectively for Tullamore at times.

I think Eoin Carroll has proven himself to be our best midfielder in last couple of years and I think he should be left there.
Rigney was a big loss yesterday too. In fact I think our spine 3,6, 8, 9, 11 was not as strong yesterday as it has been at other points in Maughan's reign. I am not at all saying that lads who played in them spots are not good enough but some for me would be more suited to wing positions - either half back or half forward. If we can sort our spine out for next year, we are capable of beating any team outside the top 6 in the country. It was a great league and well done to the squad and management on that. Unfortunately, I felt after a bright start yesterday, the second half was very disappointing.
jimbob

Kevin
All Star
Posts: 963
Joined: Thu Dec 02, 2004 10:00 pm
Location: New Jersey

Re: Offaly v Kildare Leinster SFC 1/4 Final 2021

Post by Kevin »

jimbob17 wrote: Mon Jul 05, 2021 12:07 pm
summerindublin wrote: Mon Jul 05, 2021 11:15 am Unfortunately, I felt after a bright start yesterday, the second half was very disappointing.
Had it on radio. When we started misfiring in our scoring end early in the game it gave a sinking feeling. Sounded like an early 6 or 7 point lead was on if we had been able to execute.

Thanks for the great effort this year to the lads and all involved.
Kevin Clancey. Signed out of respect for players and all involved with Offaly.

Anonymous1
All Star
Posts: 328
Joined: Mon Jul 05, 2021 3:10 pm

Re: Offaly v Kildare Leinster SFC 1/4 Final 2021

Post by Anonymous1 »

Well, where do I start with this one. A game we could and probably should have won.

Got off to a good start as we’ve done in all our games, leading 0-04 to 0-03 at the water break albeit we could’ve been 4 or 5 up, it really felt like this time might be different but we stuttered from there, kicking some very poor wides. Anton squandered a one on one goal chance and less than ten minutes into the second half at 0-09 to 0-05 down, it felt like we’d let it slip. The water breaks have not been kind to us this year, we seem to lose all momentum coming out of them.

If Eoin Carroll’s goal chance creeps inside the post early in the second half, I think we would’ve went on to win the game.

Alas, Neil Flynn’s goal killed any chance of a comeback but I’m not sure that opportunity arises had Eoin Rigney still been on the pitch. His injury forced us into earlier subs than we normally make and as a result, we had nobody to spring on late in the game to give us the jolt we needed.

We did look leggy in the second half, no doubt playing 6 games in 7 weeks caught up to us but that’s not why we lost nor was it the refs fault. We just didn’t convert when given the opportunity. The best team, albeit marginally did win.

Overall, I thought we held up well defensively once again. Holding Kildare to 1-15 is solid considering Meath could only hold them to 1-14.

Clare by 2 points, Meath by 2 points, Kildare by 4 points and Kildare by 5 points.

All games that were there for the taking but ultimately came up just short. Although we lost this one by 5, I feel like we’re a lot to closer to the top teams than in previous years. Kildare are now a division 1 team so we’ve certainly proved we belong and can compete in division 2.
I think we can safely say we’re the 4th best team in Leinster.


The goal this year was to get promoted and we achieved that, anything else was a bonus although had we won yesterday, a date against Westmeath to book a Leinster final place would have been sweet.

I don’t agree with the narrative that we wouldn’t have been promoted in a normal division 3 league. We beat 4 of the 5 teams in the division, the other two were Cavan and Longford. One was relegated and the other lost by 22 points yesterday. Our only loss was against a Derry side who could easily be promoted again next year.

Paddy Dunican has proven himself to be an excellent shot stopper. If he can clean up some of his kickouts, we have our No.1 for the next 15 years.

Our full back line is probably the strongest line in our team, Eoin Rigney has been our best player throughout this campaign, narrowly ahead of Cian Farrell. James Lalor filled in very nicely for Declan Hogan and Niall Darby doesn’t seem to age at all.

Our half back line needs some work, Johnny Moloney is a solid No.6 but we really need to improve at wingback, I heard Maughan mentioning Rory Egan in his post match interview, I could see him slotting in there nicely and hopefully Joey O’Connor will be ready to claim his spot back too.

Our midfielders are honest, hard working lads but we need some height in there to win kickouts when we can’t go short. I agree a switch to centre forward might work for Peter Cunningham and with rumours of Eoin Carroll leaving the country flying around, we might need two new midfielders. Jordan Hayes can be one, Maughan mentioned Cathal Donoghue too in his interview, could he be the other?

The half forward line was a bit of a mixed bag. We never really seemed to settle on a centre forward so that needs addressing, Anton had some great performances followed by some stinkers and I’m sorry but Shane Horan offered nothing to us throughout this campaign, he scored 3 points in the first two games and nothing for the last four. Niall Mcnamee had the same amount in ten minutes against Limerick...

Which brings me on to the full forward line, hopefully Niall stays for one more year but we can’t be relying on a 36 year old to keep us in division 2. Cian Farrell was our breakthrough star of the campaign and has a very bright future ahead of him. Panda and Ruairí Mcnamee both had good flashes but weren’t consistent enough throughout. What’s glaringly obvious is we’re missing a goalscorer, hopefully Cian Johnson can provide that next year.

Onto some of the subs then, I thought Carl Stewart filled in nicely at centre back when Moloney was out although he was found out against Derry but he’s not a centre forward. Bill Carroll had a decent first year and can definitely be a starter in this team. Cathal Mangan did okay when given a chance.

Other than that, Duffy, Chillie, Maher, Bryant, Leavy, Quinn, Abbott, Donohoe didn’t get significant game time to be judged. Would be nice to see a couple of these given worthwhile minutes in the O’Byrne Cup to see if they’re up to the task. I’m not sure the panel is as strong as I thought it was a few games ago.

The progress in this team is there for all to see, we’ve won 6 of our last 9 games in all competitions and only looked out of place in one of those. 2 championship wins in Leinster in 2 years is great to see too after only 1 win in the previous 13. No doubt we would’ve picked up a few backdoor wins too which really would’ve benefitted us. Barring he gets an offer from the likes of a Mayo, Maughan should be back next year to lead these lads into division 2.

Roll on December!
Last edited by Anonymous1 on Tue Jul 06, 2021 11:53 am, edited 1 time in total.

summerindublin
All Star
Posts: 197
Joined: Thu Aug 25, 2011 11:50 am
Club: New York

Re: Offaly v Kildare Leinster SFC 1/4 Final 2021

Post by summerindublin »

Anonymous1 wrote: Mon Jul 05, 2021 3:56 pm Cathal Mangan did okay when given a chance
I feel that Cathal Mangan needs to be plying his trade with a senior club to bring him to the next level.

User avatar
mynamesjeff
Intermediate
Posts: 47
Joined: Thu Oct 01, 2020 9:32 am

Re: Offaly v Kildare Leinster SFC 1/4 Final 2021

Post by mynamesjeff »

summerindublin wrote: Tue Jul 06, 2021 11:25 am
Anonymous1 wrote: Mon Jul 05, 2021 3:56 pm Cathal Mangan did okay when given a chance
I feel that Cathal Mangan needs to be plying his trade with a senior club to bring him to the next level.
You’d imagine being in with a county setup would help more than that. I’d hate to see someone transfer from their own club, especially since Kilclonfert would be low on numbers.

Perhaps potentially a divisional team of Ballycommon, Daingean and Kilclonfert?

jimbob17
All Star
Posts: 910
Joined: Wed Apr 25, 2007 12:40 am

Re: Offaly v Kildare Leinster SFC 1/4 Final 2021

Post by jimbob17 »

Love to see following happen but prob never will for local political reasons.

Daingean are getting stronger and will prove to be strong again in a number of years when the work they are doing at underage level comes through.

Cappincur are currently senior but not sure that will be sustained over time - Reliant on Carrolls and couple of others and their depth would not be great.

Ballycommon have some really good talent but are struggling to get out of intermediate. I think they are a group that could potentially go up and compete at senior if they push on and hold on to all their players.

Kilclonfert are just really struggling for numbers but have a couple of very good players - just not enough of them at right age.

I think it would be brilliant for Offaly if two of these joined to make one strong senior club. For example Cappincur Ballycommon together would be a serious outfit and location wise Daingean Kilclonfert would be a second option. It would help grow football in these areas and get them playing up at higher level...

St Vincents has got all clubs working closer together and this may be an option further down the track when the "legacy politics" is further in the past. I think it would make sense for players in these clubs too and also the county - but getting this over the line could prove harder than any USA Russian relations.
jimbob

Fairplayalways
All Star
Posts: 875
Joined: Mon Jul 30, 2018 5:12 pm

Re: Offaly v Kildare Leinster SFC 1/4 Final 2021

Post by Fairplayalways »

Some good posts above...we had extra man for 10 minutes, and 2 extra men then for last 5 minutes, knockout championship..you wouldnt think it was with the way we were messing around over passing and over complicating things with the clock showing time was amoste expired..I cannot get my head around that at all..Cork got lucky at the very same carry on last in the Munster semi final last winter against Kerry...surely to God with 90 seconds or so left on the clock someone has a go or drives through with the ball Ciaran McManus style and lets fly...no, we dont do that, we tip and pass back, passing as far away from goal as we possibly can...I cant understand it, loose trying to win, not trying to keep the ball...

above said, when we did loose posession Kildare adopted abit of the Dublin keepball tactic which is disgraceful in the game in recent times...but infairness to Kildare if they got near the posts they had a pop for a score...

I see people saying this and that about Cunninham, to me he is one of our better footballer and tries and tries and runs at defences..we are alot lot better than we were, but just too cautious, need a few more Cian Farrells etc..lads to have a go...a good year over all and lost in Leinster by 4 points...we have had worst years...

Post Reply