Clare GAA discussion thread

BnB

letowski wrote: »

Club Clare reporting Colm Galvin and Cathal 'Tots' O'Connell will resume training. Hopefully we get 100pc from the two lads now.

Really great news. Ian's displays over the last two weekends only served as a reminder of what a class act the two Galvins are.

There will be serious competition for places now if everyone steps up to the plate and we could be looking at having 4 or 5 very serious prospects on the bench.

http://www.hoganstand.com/ArticleForm.aspx?ID=267670

letowski

Best of look to Ballyea tomorrow, I swear I saw a couple of people wear black and amber gear walking down Dame Street this evening over here. I'm sure there village will be a proper ghost town tomorrow! But in all seriousness, they have had a brilliant season and a win in Croker would be an outstanding achievement for their club.

I find myself looking forward to seeing Tony's performance, I think the stage is set for him as he has lit up this championship. That said it is important for him to remember not to put too much pressure on himself he has a good team around him. But I think we could see something similar to Connelly's performance for Vincents in the football club final a few years ago.

Tell me how

letowski wrote:

Best of look to Ballyea tomorrow, I swear I saw a couple of people wear black and amber gear walking down Dame Street this evening over here. I'm sure there village will be a proper ghost town tomorrow! But in all seriousness, they have had a brilliant season and a win in Croker would be an outstanding achievement for their club.

Love seeing all the good wishes and flags around other parishes, villages clubs etc. Real feel that the county is behind them.

Clareman

It's like Clare are in the final with all the flags/posters/car stuff that's around the place. They've a great chance tomorrow and hopefully they can pull it off.

LuckyGent88

About to head up to Dublin for the weekend. Suppose I'll have to support ballyea!!!!! Amazing to think that we beat by 9 points in the first round. They have come along way from that game.

Something about their run just says that their name is on the trophy. Remarkable comeback against thurlas.

Still skeptical of their forwards and have leaned heavily on TK and deasy for their scores. Will need others to contribute to the scoreline today but reckon TK is going to cause havoc. The stage is just set for him and no better man to do it.

Cuala have a very strong team on paper who have plenty of experience so this could be a cracker and a tight affair.

I'll go for ballyea by 2

Auldloon

best of luck to the Clare men

Noveight

Need a big second half from Tony and Co.

Dyr

Ballyea up to nothing much except dirty pulling. Ref is letting them away with murder

Clareman

That was extremely disappointing, they didn't show up and Tony Kelly had 1 of his worst ever games. Fair play for them getting there.

Noveight

Barbie!sBitch wrote: »

Fair play for them getting there.

That's the best thing that could be said about it, unfortunately. Great achievement in itself, just fell short at the last hurdle.

Clareman

It was like they changed their gameplan completely, they went from a free flowing team who never stopped running to a team that had to stop to look every time they got the ball.

letowski

Cuala were by far the superior hurling team, it was fairly clear early on. Ballyea though can be proud to have gotten to the final all the same. I thought the Ballyea county lads didn't go well for the most part, it meant they had no chance of winning the game. I wasn't particularly impressed by Deasy being at the game, I didn't think his touch was good, nor do I think he has a high appetite for work. It wouldn't be fair though to judge him on toady after a great season, we will need to see him at intercounty level.

windy shepard henderson

great year for ballyea in fairness ,but credit and serious credit at that has to go to cuala

they were excellent and while cuala were a south dublin team ballyea were a west clare team in the same vain , hopfully dublin hurling can now reach the next level and gain the support of the county,


from a clare point of view it cant be a bad thing either to have guys like pearse lillis putting his name up for the 21s panel and the likes of neill deasy for the seniors , they have been a great ambassador for clare hurling and to be more precise west clare hurling , they have given a chance to every aspiring hurler in the county be it east or west that they can do the same in future , and for that clare hurling will be stronger for.

Figerty

Barbie!sBitch wrote: »

It was like they changed their gameplan completely, they went from a free flowing team who never stopped running to a team that had to stop to look every time they got the ball.

Cuala enforced their game plan on Ballyea. They had better hurlers all round and had studied the Ballyea team very well. Double marking Kelly and tracking his runs to stop the breaking runs he gets fed on all the time by the ball winners.
Doohan and Deasy have been excellent all year at feeding the moving kelly, but that was cut out.
Secondly, forcing Ballyea to go short to a corner back with the puck out, and the full forwards immediately pressurising the player in possession immediately killed Ballyea's possession. Galway did the same last year to Clare. It's easy plan these things, but not easy do it. Cuala did it very well..

Tell me how

Figerty wrote:

Secondly, forcing Ballyea to go short to a corner back with the puck out, and the full forwards immediately pressurising the player in possession immediately killed Ballyea's possession...... It's easy plan these things, but not easy do it. Cuala did it very well..

Agreed. Do feel that Ballyea never clicked though either.
Full back line looked like minors brought in after regulars got injured. When they got those short puckouts, they dropped them, panicked, or mis hit their pass/shot.

Pity they may have feeling of underperforming at the end of their journey given how well they did to get there. To pull through as they did against Clonlara, Thurles and Thomas's showed they deserved to be there.

windy shepard henderson

fermanagh 0-18 - 1-10 clare

disappointing result and very disappointing performance by the footballers in enniskillen , nothing went right in a performance like the galway game lacked any intensity or belief , gary brennan lined out at midfield 2 days after playing in an all ireland club final , to be fair he was still feeling the affects of his efforts 48 hours earlier and never got into the game , cathal o'connor tried hard also but the affects of his injury has not gone away

fermannagh exploited our weakness in the middle and used it to there advantage kicking some excellent scores from distance , eoin donnelly and ryan jones killed us in the second half , while sean quigley kicked nearly half of the winners scores

the brighter sparkes in clare jerseys were few keelan sexton and jamie malone had very quiet games , while eoin cleary struggled toget the better of his man for most of the game tubridy and john hayes were probably our best performers but a massive improvement is required for kildare next sunday especially how good they looked last night away in newry

clare scorers

david tubridy 0-4
eoin cleary 0-4
keelan sexton 1-0
jamie malone 0-1
sean malone 0-1

windy shepard henderson

the league table has us in mid table with two games to go , one win will guarantee division 2 football for next year 2 wins from our our last two would put us in a strong promotion position while 2 defeats will send us back down to division 3 for next year , the latter would be unthinkable after such a good year last year

Clareman

Clare have Kildare and Meath in their last 2 games, really we should be targeting the Meath game as I don't think we'd have enough for Kildare away.

Of the teams below us, Cork have Derry (A) and Down (H) you'd imagine they'd win at least 1 of those which will get them above Clare.
Down have Galway and Cork, they are going to struggle to get a point there so they should stay below us
Fermanagh have Meath and Derry, you'd imagine they'd have enough for at least 1 win, that'll put them above us.
Derry have Cork and Fermanagh, it's hard to see them getting 2 wins so that should keep them below us.

windy shepard henderson

Barbie!sBitch wrote: »

Clare have Kildare and Meath in their last 2 games, really we should be targeting the Meath game as I don't think we'd have enough for Kildare away.

Of the teams below us, Cork have Derry (A) and Down (H) you'd imagine they'd win at least 1 of those which will get them above Clare.
Down have Galway and Cork, they are going to struggle to get a point there so they should stay below us
Fermanagh have Meath and Derry, you'd imagine they'd have enough for at least 1 win, that'll put them above us.
Derry have Cork and Fermanagh, it's hard to see them getting 2 wins so that should keep them below us.

there is the extreme possibility that we may avoid the drop without picking up any more points but reality is we need to win one more game , if we do lose our next two we will deserve to go down as we said here in the past in relation to our last 3 games

we beat kildare when it mattered last year and no one gave them a chance , and our home record has been fairly solid not just this year but last year also so i still see one more win in us , but much better performance required in both games ,today simply was not good enough

buck65

Div 1 next year would be worse than Div 3!

windy shepard henderson

buck65 wrote: »

Div 1 next year would be worse than Div 3!

while i could be accused for lack of ambition i agree, few things have shocked me in the recent weeks

1 lack of attendance , roughly 2700 attended the games against cork and down in the park , we were nearly getting attendances of that size in division 4

2 i dread to think of a saturday night match in croke park with such a young bench especially most of which are u21 or minors and have little club senior championship played let alone the elite level and big defeats on a regular basis would be bad all round for player development

3 while it would be great to move up in divisions reality is consolidation would be the best for everyone at the moment , i wouldn't welcome a drop in division however

Clareman

I know you'll only get better by playing better teams, but there isn't a team in division 2 that we'd be overly frightened of, I don't think there's a team in division 1 that we'd be confident of beating. Couple of years in division 2 to mature as a squad and then a stint in division 1 would be spot on.

Twiceasnice97

windy shepard henderson wrote: »

great year for ballyea in fairness ,but credit and serious credit at that has to go to cuala

they were excellent and while cuala were a south dublin team ballyea were a west clare team in the same vain , hopfully dublin hurling can now reach the next level and gain the support of the county,


from a clare point of view it cant be a bad thing either to have guys like pearse lillis putting his name up for the 21s panel and the likes of neill deasy for the seniors , they have been a great ambassador for clare hurling and to be more precise west clare hurling , they have given a chance to every aspiring hurler in the county be it east or west that they can do the same in future , and for that clare hurling will be stronger for.

pearse lillis has had a fantastic season for ballyea. A real warrior who showed up in croke park and put in a decent performance but his skill level isnt good enough for the clare under 21 hurling team in my view.

In fact its a shame he didn't play for the 21s v Kerry in the football

windy shepard henderson

Twiceasnice97 wrote: »

pearse lillis has had a fantastic season for ballyea. A real warrior who showed up in croke park and put in a decent performance but his skill level isnt good enough for the clare under 21 hurling team in my view.

In fact its a shame he didn't play for the 21s v Kerry in the football

yeah probably wont make it but his age would be an advantage , you can still see the footballer in him when hes hurling

buck65

Not a hope of Lillis hurling with county teams , same as Brennan. Decent club players but not beyond that. Brennan very limited with ball in hand.

windy shepard henderson

buck65 wrote: »

Not a hope of Lillis hurling with county teams , same as Brennan. Decent club players but not beyond that. Brennan very limited with ball in hand.

Yeah you can see the awkward football style in them . Lillis has been affective for them though.

Predictions on the weekend . Will we be relaying on a Dublin win in Parnell . Or will we improve on the last day to see us in a 1/4 final against limerick or Galway

letowski

windy shepard henderson wrote: »

Yeah you can see the awkward football style in them . Lillis has been affective for them though.

Predictions on the weekend . Will we be relaying on a Dublin win in Parnell . Or will we improve on the last day to see us in a 1/4 final against limerick or Galway

It's a very hard one to call this weekend as both teams have been in very inconsistent form. If we play like a fortnight ago we will be in trouble. The forwards have step up, players like Conlon and Shanagher have either been red hot or very wasteful. Backs should hold Waterford to a beatable score, Seadna will probably be our extra man as they will play with one at their end. He can excel in this role I think.

The team selection tomorrow morning will be very interesting as Reidy being out means someone is going to have to take the frees. That could bring Deasy straight into the team. Also Shanahan probably isn't really the best option to be persisting with at midfield either.

Id go:

Tuohy
DMac - Dillon - Morey
Bugs - Cleary - Fitz
Kelly - McCarthy
Deasy(f) - Podge - Malone
I. Galvin
Conlon - Shanagher

If sticking with form, McCarthy should earn a start for this game over bringing Colm Galvin straight in, Colm will get his opportunity and will start come c'ship, but it's important to send the right message to the squad that form will be rewarded. Cunningham and McInerney are best suited to the bench for me. I'd also like to have a look at Gudgie as a cornerback, but I'm not sure where he is playing in training. Colin Ryan could see some action off the bench too, actually there's a great squad there for Donal and Gerry to mix and match with and still have a good bench, even though we are down 5 starters and 1 and 2 more.

windy shepard henderson

letowski wrote: »

It's a very hard one to call this weekend as both teams have been in very inconsistent form. If we play like a fortnight ago we will be in trouble. The forwards have step up, players like Conlon and Shanagher have either been red hot or very wasteful. Backs should hold Waterford to a beatable score, Seadna will probably be our extra man as they will play with one at their end. He can excel in this role I think.

The team selection tomorrow morning will be very interesting as Reidy being out means someone is going to have to take the frees. That could bring Deasy straight into the team. Also Shanahan probably isn't really the best option to be persisting with at midfield either.

Id go:

Tuohy
DMac - Dillon - Morey
Bugs - Cleary - Fitz
Kelly - McCarthy
Deasy(f) - Podge - Malone
I. Galvin
Conlon - Shanagher

If sticking with form, McCarthy should earn a start for this game over bringing Colm Galvin straight in, Colm will get his opportunity and will start come c'ship, but it's important to send the right message to the squad that form will be rewarded. Cunningham and McInerney are best suited to the bench for me. I'd also like to have a look at Gudgie as a cornerback, but I'm not sure where he is playing in training. Colin Ryan could see some action off the bench too, actually there's a great squad there for Donal and Gerry to mix and match with and still have a good bench, even though we are down 5 starters and 1 and 2 more.

Panel is starting to come together. I think Jason won't start nor Ian galvin . I think both could as impact subs . I think deasy will get a start .

If Waterford bring player's back the field it will play into the hands of David Mac and morey just like the second half of the Dublin game

Need to bring same level of intenseity to the game as we did against Kilkenny or even tipperary otherwise we're heading for a playoff

letowski

Clare Starting 15 versus Waterford (numbers as per match day programme):

1. Andrew Fahy (Whitegate)

2. David McInerney (Tulla)
3. Cian Dillon (Crusheen)
4. Seadna Morey (Sixmilebridge)

22. Jason McCarthy (Inagh-Kilnamona)
6. Conor Cleary (St. Josephs Miltown)
7. David Fitzgerald (Inagh-Kilnamona)

8. Jamie Shanahan (Sixmilebridge)
9. Tony Kelly (Ballyea) Captain

10. Cathal Malone (Sixmilebridge)
11. Podge Collins (Cratloe)
12. John Conlon (Clonlara)

13. Cathal McInerney (Cratloe)
14. Aron Shanagher (Wolfe Tones na Sionna)
18. Ian Galvin (Clonlara)

Substitutes:
16. Donal Tuohy (Crusheen)
17. Shane Golden (Sixmilebridge)
15. Aaron Cunningham (Wolfe Tones na Sionna)
19. Patrick Donnellan (O'Callaghan's Mills)
20. Jack Browne (Ballyea)
21. Peter Duggan (Clooney-Quin)
5. Brendan Bugler (Whitegate)
23. Paul Flanagan (Ballyea)
24. Bobby Duggan (Clarecastle)
25. Gearóid O'Connell (Ballyea)
26. Colm Galvin (Clonlara)

Decent team, although a bit disappointed Deasy isn't in the 26. Biggest call is Bugler dropping to the bench, it could do massive damage to his chances of starting come championship. You couldn't say Jason McCarthy hasn't deserved a start though, he has been excellent when introduced. It's actually a very skillful pacey backline, more than a tough physical one. Happy Ian Galvin gets another shot, it could be a battle between him and Cathal Mc for a start in June. There's tonnes of competition in the squad actually which is good.

Its a positive, offensive selection all in all, looking forward to the game.

Clareman

That's a good balanced team with loads of competition for places, SoD and Deasy have to find a way onto the panel let alone the team