Offaly v Longford

A forum to air your views on Offaly GAA matters and beyond.
offalyman
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Re: Offaly v Longford

Post by offalyman »

I'm not going to start slating players or anything like that...but anyone that was at the match yesterday could see it was played at a pedestrian pace...by possibly 2 of the worst teams in the country...marking was so loose on both sides it was laughable at times.Once Longford started to kick out the ball long the completely took over the game,Longford were alot more wasteful in front of goal than Offaly they missed four great goals chances aswell,we missed little or nothing...The Stat that Offaly havent won a game in the Leinster Championship sense 2007 speaks for itself...we are dreadful lets face it,no improvement at all year on year...I actually thought (like an egit) we'd win yesterday.The glory days are well gone let face it.For anyone who were lucky enough to Follow Offaly teams in the 80's and 90's cheerish them days they aint coming back...I remember travelling to Croke Park 6 out of 7 sundays in a row in the late 90's ( i'm sure it was 99 by the way) following the Hurlers and footballers,them were the days lads...............What are we going to do about it??
Get Rid of McDonnell first.....Same aul waffle out of him the last 2 years after everygame...spend the cash and get in a top Coach get all the lads available to us back and sure w'll take it from there...give them the best of training....haven to go to the bottom of laois to train is disgrace aswell...sort that mess out aswell...I'm not expecting miracles...O just want us to win a game in Leinster this time next year.

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Lone Shark
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Re: Offaly v Longford

Post by Lone Shark »

Excellent post from Mountain Man, summarises the whole thing quite well for me.

Coming away from the game, I think the hardest part to deal with is the fact that I don't think there's an awful lot of easy improvement to be made on what we saw up there, it'll be a long hard road to recovery. Both sides missed chances but Longford missed a lot more than we did, while we had just one goal chance and they could have had four - certainly I felt we were very lucky to have that goal disallowed early on. On another day we could easily have lost by a lot more.

I'd be very slow to criticise the forwards. Joe Maher made a couple of mistakes but he never stopped showing, he was often outnumbered and the two chances he got to kick points he took them both. The pick up was sloppy and was punished, but he'll learn and I'd certainly say that it makes more sense to give him a chance to lock down the position than to fall back on guys who have had oodles of starts and never really established themselves. Niall was at his brilliant best for most of the game, Peter Cunningham was very good, Guilfoyle had probably his best game ever in an Offaly jersey until he tired, Eoin Carroll didn't look like a player who was still under-21 next year and was very good in the tackle and from general play, while Anton worked very hard and carried a lot of ball well - a couple of better passes into him and from him and he would have had a really big day.

Defensively too, we actually weren't that bad. David Brady has quietly matured into an effective corner back who puts his body on the line, Michael Brazil was excellent and John Moloney was decent and probably would have been better if he hadn't been working with a yellow card for two thirds of the game. As I'll come to below, I think a lot of why McGee did so well at centre forward for Longford was down to instruction.

For me however, it all boiled down to primary possession and our terrible performance in that regard. Longford clearly had no faith in their own midfield, hence their faffing around with short kickouts and balls over the sideline at the start, but slowly it dawned on them that they were meeting a team, perhaps the only team in Ireland, who was even worse under the kickout than they were. They then started to go long and down the middle, and they cleaned up. A big part if this was Francis McGee under breaks, as he dropped off the centre forward spot and went into the midfield to look for scraps. It was notable here that when he did this, John Moloney held the middle, as I imagine would have been the instruction. That's all very well and I'd tend to agree with not leaving a big hole where your centre back should be, but either Anton, Peter or someone else should have been detailed to pick up McGee when the management saw that happening, and they never were.

I don't believe that we were less fit than Longford, but playing without the ball is a hell of a lot more tiring than playing with it, and we spent the first twenty five minutes of the second half chasing Longford players in possession. Our forwards worked their socks off making tackles but in the case of most of them (Eoin Carroll would be the honourable exception for me) they didn't have either the tackling technique or the physicality to actually turn the ball over. They never stopped trying and that's all that you can ask as a supporter, but that's something that won't come easily, it'll have to be worked on.

But for me, that's why Longford were flying in the closing stages, and why our lads were out on their feet. That won't change until we figure out a way to win at least 60% of our own kickouts and 40% of the opposition ones. Either that, or we get a lot better at turning the ball over out the field. Those are the two ways you win the ball and right now we're not good at either. In an average seventy minute game, you should get between forty five and fifty possessions - I'd say we had a lot less.

Also, without being harsh, it's fair to say that the bench is very shallow. I wouldn't fault any of the lads that came in but it's reasonable to say that none of them were potential game changers. I agree with the posters above who say that this isn't about saying that others should be in the panel instead, merely that I don't know if we have the kind of guys that you could send on with fifteen minutes to go and say that they could cause real problems for the opposition. This will only come as players mature from underage and get specialist guidance on how to play certain roles.

We have five weeks now until the qualifiers - I wrote last week about how the Leinster championship was the only show in town for this Offaly team and I believe it - however it would be great to get a good result somewhere so that lads will have something to hold on to before they're called into action again next winter.
Kevin Egan. Signed out of respect for players and all involved with Offaly.

offalyman
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Re: Offaly v Longford

Post by offalyman »

Who would we beat in the Qualifiers Lone Shark?

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Lone Shark
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Re: Offaly v Longford

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offalyman wrote:Who would we beat in the Qualifiers Lone Shark?
No such thing as a certainty anywhere in sport, but in my opinion we'd be favourites to varying degrees against Carlow, Waterford and London, we'd be somewhere between 40/60 and 60/40 against Leitrim, Wicklow, Limerick, Clare and dangerous outsiders against Antrim, Fermanagh, Sligo and Tipperary, and maybe even Westmeath, given their low ebb right now. There's probably about four or five other teams where we'd be between 7/2 and 5/1 to win if we got a home draw and so there would be a chance of an upset on a good day, but after that it would be a write off. The key will be to avoid the bulk of the Ulster teams that will be in the pot since there are some serious sides up there. The idea of a trip to Donegal, Derry, Tyrone or Monaghan is worrying given where we are right now.

Also since we got a home draw last year, we'll automatically be away to any team who played away from home in their first qualifier tie in 2013. As I type, I realise that's Laois, Tyrone, Antrim, Fermanagh, Wicklow, Sligo, Limerick, Waterford, Down and Wexford. In fact we're very unlikely to get a game in Tullamore, all things considered. That won't help either.
Kevin Egan. Signed out of respect for players and all involved with Offaly.

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Re: Offaly v Longford

Post by Ahlethimoutwithit »

I thought all of the backs were cleaned out, very few of them got out to the ball in front of their oponent. Maloney was poor LS, yes he may have been following instruction but he was very slow. I think he needs to be utilised elsewhere as he is no where near mobile enough.
Anton could have been taken off at half time LS and his distribution , bar the ball into Joe Maher that he picked off the ground was bad.

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Re: Offaly v Longford

Post by The Biff »

I feel I'm getting too used to displays like that. The sense of inevitability about it. Below are random thoughts, as disjointed as I usually am (I don't do good match summaries).

Most matches, we seem to have a "purple patch" where we do dominate play for a while. So at least we do have something in the team that can work. We just need it to work for longer, and we need to learn how to adapt OUR game-plan when our opposition has learned to adapt theirs.

Who was the last good/decent recognizable Full-back on our senior team? We have really suffered by trying to show-horn players more used to other positions into this crucial role. Brian Kavanagh is a better-than-average Full-Forward too, so that meant he made lot of hay even before Hanlon lost his head.

How well can you really plan or practice how to win breaking ball in midfield? Is it not really a bit of a lottery almost by definition? So much of the knock-downs are not predictable and it comes down to luck regarding who is in the right place to get the ball. We did well for periods and unlucky otherwise. Some of the best catches of the day were by Eoin Carroll. Maybe a better work-rate gives you a better chance of getting the breaking ball, but surely there is still room for winning a good clean catch, with a little more protection against nudges in the back" from better referees and linesmen.

This ref was overall poor in my view. Some of those frees given for handling on the ground were not correct on both sides, and it creates huge frustration. The way he sent off Hanlon also undermined his own authority. He missed so many back-shoves and practical body-slams (where the tackler "fell" on top of the ball-catcher just as he caught the ball) that you'd wonder should you actually try to catch the ball at all.

Niall McNamee is a class act. Thank God he is one of us, or think how bad we would be without him. Some of his scores were as good as you will ever see.

Subs - I thought Guilfoyle and Allen were among our better players, yet they were subbed first. When we needed scores late one, would Ken Casey not have been a better option to bring on?

The future - is there any point in shafting Emmet McDonnell unless we know we have someone much better to replace him? What is the point in keeping going back to square 1 with a new manager every year or two? I'm not saying he is the best available, but there is little point in changing just for changes sake.

My Faith in the Faithful is being tested, but these Allegiances cannot be changed. Some day, we might have another player nearly as good as Niall Mc, and hopefully a good few supporting players a bit better than the current average. I'll cling on to that hope.

p.s. Lone Shark - was that you with a nice shiny red laptop in the main "Stand"? You're a brave man bringing that among the Land of the Slashers. And was that BnMm doing bodyguard for you? Hmmmm. Maybe I should have said Hello.
Peter Parker: I missed the part where that's MY problem.

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Re: Offaly v Longford

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offalyman wrote:I'm not going to start slating players or anything like that...but anyone that was at the match yesterday could see it was played at a pedestrian pace...by possibly 2 of the worst teams in the country...marking was so loose on both sides it was laughable at times.Once Longford started to kick out the ball long the completely took over the game,Longford were alot more wasteful in front of goal than Offaly they missed four great goals chances aswell,we missed little or nothing...The Stat that Offaly havent won a game in the Leinster Championship sense 2007 speaks for itself...we are dreadful lets face it,no improvement at all year on year...I actually thought (like an egit) we'd win yesterday.The glory days are well gone let face it.For anyone who were lucky enough to Follow Offaly teams in the 80's and 90's cheerish them days they aint coming back...I remember travelling to Croke Park 6 out of 7 sundays in a row in the late 90's ( i'm sure it was 99 by the way) following the Hurlers and footballers,them were the days lads...............What are we going to do about it??
Get Rid of McDonnell first.....Same aul waffle out of him the last 2 years after everygame...spend the cash and get in a top Coach get all the lads available to us back and sure w'll take it from there...give them the best of training....haven to go to the bottom of laois to train is disgrace aswell...sort that mess out aswell...I'm not expecting miracles...O just want us to win a game in Leinster this time next year.

some good points made there, but i wouldn't hold my breath waiting for the county board to splash out, you know what they will do, instead of leaving Pascal Kellaghan over offaly minors for a few years and maybe 2 years under 21 they will fast track him for the senior job next year wait and see.

i have to say fair play to Pascal for coming back to the offaly minor job after the way the county
board fcuk him about with the under 21 job two years ago and made McDonnell manger over the two cheap shits again killing two birds with the one stone Andy Gallagher said as much, theres a good few rotten Apples in the county board and have been there for many years its time for a sweep out at the top of offaly GAA , no point in blaming players they are doing their best, for the love of god can the county board members not see themselfs how they are killing the hurling and football in our county its not fcuking theirs.

as i was quote in the papers from this site early in the year what i said is coming to fruit, you can play a double header in Geashill soon as there will be no one to watch offaly GAA anymore

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Re: Offaly v Longford

Post by SearingDrive »

Disappointed with yesterday's result, as I thought Offaly would win , especially given the opening 20 minutes, when we were the better side. Longford got on top from then until the end. Offaly rallied towards the end. i can't see why Offaly forwards were carrying the ball from their own defence in the game, leaving our remaining forwards isolated.
I thought management could have replaced some defenders, who were in difficulty. That's all, on to the qualifiers.

Truth as i see it
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Re: Offaly v Longford

Post by Truth as i see it »

There's a good few rotten Apples in the county board and have been there for many years its time for a sweep out at the top of offaly GAA , no point in blaming players they are doing their best, for the love of god can the county board members not see themselfs how they are killing the hurling and football in our county its not fcuking theirs.

For once i agree with you, and its not the fact that they're not trying that' annoying me, i actually believe they are but they are of a certain generation that can't understand (not doesn't want to) but flat out, straight up cannot comprehend the fact that the game has evolved to the point where it is now professional in everything but name now

How can the county fix the problem when they don't understand what they are to begin with?

It has just occurred to me that what the county board badly needs is a think tank company to come in to help them to reorganize the county at all levels

It needs a group of people who has the ability to find a way of making our assets work for us rather than against us, that's what Connacht rugby has done over the past number of years, they're structure and set up pre-2010 was very similar to our own, badly organized, no vision, a lack of facilities but around two years ago the formed a professional games board and now they have transformed an old grayhound track into a stadium with excellent facilities where fans can be proud to come to support their team and a proper professional setup on a par with the Leinsters and the Munsters of this world

Yes i understand that rugby is a professional business these days but anyone who has followed Connachts story though out the past number of years will tell you that they were treated shabbily by the IRFU right from the start of the professional era and was run like an armature organisation now at the very least they are able to attract mid to top level talent to their club as well as making the club more appealing to local fans, certainly if you compare it to what it was like before the Professional rugby Board came along and the reason this happened was because the IRFU were smart enough to know that the way they were running professional rugby in Connacht wasn't working and they needed to bring in people who understood the problems better than they did

Bottom line, the county board don't know what they're doing but more importantly than that, they don't know enough to know that they don't know what they're doing

Instead of lambasting the county board for not knowing any better we should be trying to make them understand that they cant comprehend the problem in the first place and that they need to bring in someone who not only understands the problems but has a track record of fixing said problems

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Re: Offaly v Longford

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Ahlethimoutwithit wrote:I thought all of the backs were cleaned out, very few of them got out to the ball in front of their oponent. Maloney was poor LS, yes he may have been following instruction but he was very slow. I think he needs to be utilised elsewhere as he is no where near mobile enough.
Anton could have been taken off at half time LS and his distribution , bar the ball into Joe Maher that he picked off the ground was bad.
Just on this, I thought Moloney was decent, given that he wasn't bypassed. I've watched a lot of Offaly games this year where opposition runners spilled through the middle - Longford attempted that once here and Moloney stood his ground and took a yellow card for it - and it didn't happen again. His play forced Longford to go around us, which they did effectively because they are good ball players. Also, I think the backs were only a yard off towards the end, when fatigue was setting in - which again I attribute to playing so much of the game without the ball.

I agree that Anton wasn't really clicking in the sense that he wasn't creating scoring chances or finishing them either, but he never stopped trying and I would have fancied him to produce something more than I would have fancied any of the subs to do so. Emmet and the selectors may have felt the same. Also, I'm reluctant to criticise anyone who burst his lungs from start to finish - particularly when I was completely disgusted at the end watching one of our players going down, taking a water bottle and then watching the game on one knee for thirty seconds, before popping up again when Longford killed the ball over the end line (I can't remember if it was a point or a wide). In hindsight I'm nearly sorry I didn't take twenty seconds of video on the phone and email it on to the management.
The Biff wrote: How well can you really plan or practice how to win breaking ball in midfield? Is it not really a bit of a lottery almost by definition? So much of the knock-downs are not predictable and it comes down to luck regarding who is in the right place to get the ball. We did well for periods and unlucky otherwise. Some of the best catches of the day were by Eoin Carroll. Maybe a better work-rate gives you a better chance of getting the breaking ball, but surely there is still room for winning a good clean catch, with a little more protection against nudges in the back" from better referees and linesmen.
To a point it is a lottery, but there are still two key factors - getting yourself in the best position (i.e underneath the jumpers on the kicking side, three to four yards in front) where the break is most likely to fall, and then driving in like a madman when you're there. If you have the right attitude and the right understanding of where to be, you'll do well - we showed neither of those attributes, except for Michael Brazil who I'd say would have shown up some decent numbers on his breaking ball battle. Admittedly some of the kickouts from Mulhall baffled me, picking the side where Longford had more numbers etc. As BnaMman pointed out, I did get the feeling that Offaly's players around the middle had no idea what kind of kickout was coming, which shouldn't be the case. If we need lineout style calls to help us along with this, then so be it.

The Biff wrote: p.s. Lone Shark - was that you with a nice shiny red laptop in the main "Stand"? You're a brave man bringing that among the Land of the Slashers. And was that BnMm doing bodyguard for you? Hmmmm. Maybe I should have said Hello.
That was yours truly all right, definitely you should have made an intro! I much prefer watching matches among friends than among fellow hacks, so while I will say that the local Longford media are probably the nicest you'll meet (outside of Offaly of course! :P ) I still prefer to watch games from the stands and terraces where possible. And yes, that was Bord na Mona man keeping a watchful eye on all and sundry as well!
Kevin Egan. Signed out of respect for players and all involved with Offaly.

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Re: Offaly v Longford

Post by Killeighman »

A point on the criticism of Emmet McDonnell. If after this year he has been given the boot of left by mutual consent wouldnt it be right to swap the roles of Pascal Keelaghan and McDonnell just for the fact we know Emmet has produced the goods with lads of a minor level in school before. Pascal is itching to get a go at this job and i think he should be the man to get it when the time comes around but its too early to be talking just yet about that. Try have both championship to play so we'll let them play them and talk more about it after.

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Re: Offaly v Longford

Post by townman »

i think pascal should be left over the minors till 2015 then maybe a year or two under 21 with the minors he has this year, we should look at what the Dubs are doing Jim Galvin and Dessie Farrell
when Galvin goes Dessie will take up the job, as Galvin was also over the minors and under 21's it might take a few years but by god the county needs to do something before we lose our young lads to other sports and will be gone off the map in gaa altogether .

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Re: Offaly v Longford

Post by azoffaly »

Lone Shark wrote:
The Biff wrote: How well can you really plan or practice how to win breaking ball in midfield? Is it not really a bit of a lottery almost by definition? So much of the knock-downs are not predictable and it comes down to luck regarding who is in the right place to get the ball. We did well for periods and unlucky otherwise. Some of the best catches of the day were by Eoin Carroll. Maybe a better work-rate gives you a better chance of getting the breaking ball, but surely there is still room for winning a good clean catch, with a little more protection against nudges in the back" from better referees and linesmen.
To a point it is a lottery, but there are still two key factors - getting yourself in the best position (i.e underneath the jumpers on the kicking side, three to four yards in front) where the break is most likely to fall, and then driving in like a madman when you're there. If you have the right attitude and the right understanding of where to be, you'll do well - we showed neither of those attributes, except for Michael Brazil who I'd say would have shown up some decent numbers on his breaking ball battle. Admittedly some of the kickouts from Mulhall baffled me, picking the side where Longford had more numbers etc. As BnaMman pointed out, I did get the feeling that Offaly's players around the middle had no idea what kind of kickout was coming, which shouldn't be the case. If we need lineout style calls to help us along with this, then so be it.

The Biff wrote:
This, +1 as the cool people say. To say that the breaking ball is a lottery is true in a sense, however it is a lottery where you can stack the deck (mixed metaphors) in your favour. Be in position (most balls will break back from whence they came), and get in hard, fast and with your body. Don't go in with the T-Rex arms. Of course the odd one will hit a bad bounce, or a lad's shoulder and you'll be caught, but in general, if your half backs/half forwards are in the right position, and willing to pay the price, you will win the breaking ball battle.

Breaking ball is unreal important. We played a match there a couple of weeks ago, and in the first 15 minutes we went from winning the breaks from kickouts 4-2 (and lead 0-7 to 0-0) to losing the remainder of the half 7-2 in breaks and the half time score was 0-7 to 0-4. At half time we went through just the basics that LS has said, and we won the second half breaks 9-4 and won the game. It's not overly tactical, but it is not just a pure lottery.
Shane Gavin. Signed out of respect for players and all involved with Offaly.

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Re: Offaly v Longford

Post by Bord na Mona man »

The Biff wrote: p.s. Lone Shark - was that you with a nice shiny red laptop in the main "Stand"? You're a brave man bringing that among the Land of the Slashers. And was that BnMm doing bodyguard for you? Hmmmm. Maybe I should have said Hello.
I was thinking that fella wearing the 'Siamsa Cois Laoi 1986' t-shirt could only be yourself!

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Re: Offaly v Longford

Post by High School Musical »

Bord na Mona man wrote:
The Biff wrote: p.s. Lone Shark - was that you with a nice shiny red laptop in the main "Stand"? You're a brave man bringing that among the Land of the Slashers. And was that BnMm doing bodyguard for you? Hmmmm. Maybe I should have said Hello.
I was thinking that fella wearing the 'Siamsa Cois Laoi 1986' t-shirt could only be yourself!
This site is starting to take the appearance of Tinder, for Gaels of course.
Not that I know anything about Tinder now, before any accusations come flying in.

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