*Limerick GAA news/discussion thread*

mickmackey1

I tend to agree but then again it's only March, by July it will be forgotten and 12 months ago we weren't predicting much either... so who knows?

washman3

Galway will probably have the Portumna lads back for next Sunday.
How many of the Portumna tean will be starters this year.? Joe Canning will be an immense addition to them but I think Damien Hayes is now past his best.
Galway would have beaten Clare yesterday if they had taken their goal chances. If Joe Canning got those chances (or even have chances) it would be curtains.!!
This game will give us a better idea of where exactly we are. Team selection will be interesting. Agree with Fireball re the keeper, Murphy should start this one.

Danno

Rightwing wrote: »

...It shows the league is flawed, all the home teams are winning their games and getting an obvious advantage...

Laois beat Offaly in Tullamore, Lost to Cork and Limerick at home, narrowly. How is that flawed?

Rightwing

Danno wrote: »

Laois beat Offaly in Tullamore, Lost to Cork and Limerick at home, narrowly. How is that flawed?

Because if you get 3 home games you are getting an obvious advantage. Minnows like Laois did well, but are only making up the numbers.

markfla

Rightwing wrote: »

Because if you get 3 home games you are getting an obvious advantage. Minnows like Laois did well, but are only making up the numbers.

What a prick of a thing to say, making up numbers? It's a young Laois team with a lot of promise, we'll see next year who's making up numbers.

Rightwing

markfla wrote: »

What a prick of a thing to say, making up numbers? It's a young Laois team with a lot of promise, we'll see next year who's making up numbers.

Let's not get in the way of facts. Any team losing to Laois at the moment is in serious trouble. If they come good, I will be as happy as anyone for them.

Too many dogooders like yourself playing Mr Niceguy, 'Laois are great' etc

Hanalei

I think you could choose your words a bit more "diplomatically" there Rightwing!:D

We wouldn't be best pleased if people from Kilkenny or Cork or Tipperary dismissed Limerick as "also rans" and "minnows" and as though defeat to us would mean they are in "serious trouble"!

Rightwing

Hanalei wrote: »

I think you could choose your words a bit more "diplomatically" there Rightwing!:D

We wouldn't be best pleased if people from Kilkenny or Cork or Tipperary dismissed Limerick as "also rans" and "minnows" and as though defeat to us would mean they are in "serious trouble"!

Only thing is we are munster champs

i know what you are saying, i wasn't having a pop at laois though, i just wouldnt consider them a top team.

Fireball07

Laois beat Offaly, who are the team who denied us promotion. Laois are on a serious upward curve... we probably should be beating them at this stage, but we definitely should be beating Offaly too.

windy shepard henderson

Rightwing wrote: »

Let's not get in the way of facts. Any team losing to Laois at the moment is in serious trouble. If they come good, I will be as happy as anyone for them.

Too many dogooders like yourself playing Mr Niceguy, 'Laois are great' etc

i sopose waterford have no place in division 1 hurling ether given the fact that clare beat them by 13 last week and kk beat them yesterday by 15 . infact i expect it to be a much closer game next week for clare then that waterford game last week

you must remember clare were a division lower then them 3 or 4 years ago and in fairness to laois everyone is against them up there in terms of county boards ect.. and liam o'neill has'nt gone out of his way to do them any favors given all the posts he has held over the years

Fireball07

Browney7 wrote: »

Obviously would have been good to get out of 1b but 1b is good if you're trying to have a look at a lot of players. If you were to throw in ten new fellas against Kilkenny or Clare it could do more harm than good.

Problem is we haven't looked at that many players considering... at least, we haven't found players in any of our problem positions. Bar, maybe, David Reidy.

Rightwing

windy shepard henderson wrote: »

i sopose waterford have no place in division 1 hurling ether given the fact that clare beat them by 13 last week and kk beat them yesterday by 15 . infact i expect it to be a much closer game next week for clare then that waterford game last week

you must remember clare were a division lower then them 3 or 4 years ago and in fairness to laois everyone is against them up there in terms of county boards ect.. and liam o'neill has'nt gone out of his way to do them any favors given all the posts he has held over the years

They'd better improve bigtime or they'll be stuck in a rut.

Laois v Clare will be interesting, bookies have clare @ 1/50. but all the q/fs will, they'll let us know where we stand.

Just looking at the bookies odds. the tight games are LKvGal and Tipp v Cork.

windy shepard henderson

Rightwing wrote: »

They'd better improve bigtime or they'll be stuck in a rut.

Laois v Clare will be interesting, bookies have clare @ 1/50. but all the q/fs will, they'll let us know where we stand.

Just looking at the bookies odds. the tight games are LKvGal and Tipp v Cork.

id fancy tipp to beat cork i dont think there as bad as people are making out and cork were lucky to top there division and still look of the pace

kilkenny will beat wexford but the limerick/galway one is too close to call

Rightwing

windy shepard henderson wrote: »

id fancy tipp to beat cork i dont think there as bad as people are making out and cork were lucky to top there division and still look of the pace

kilkenny will beat wexford but the limerick/galway one is too close to call

I go along with you there, and I think Gal will win the other one unless LK improve big time.

Fireball07

windy shepard henderson wrote: »

id fancy tipp to beat cork i dont think there as bad as people are making out and cork were lucky to top there division and still look of the pace

kilkenny will beat wexford but the limerick/galway one is too close to call

I'm not sure how bad people are saying Tipp are, but they do have a lot of improving to do. I think a lot of people would agree that the league is more about performances than results, and the worrying thing for Tipp & Waterford is how utterly bad they were against Clare & Kilkenny... they were torn to pieces, and you can be sure other teams will look to that in the Championship. They have to improve, and Tipp have players to come back in but they look vulnerable.

Dublin were similarly poor against Galway & Waterford, really woeful.... and it's one thing being poorer away from home, but no-shows like that are just bad. At least Clare and KK have been reasonably consistent even when losing.



That said, Cork haven't really impressed in any game in the league tbh... but should step up with the step-up in intensity. Horgan, Lehane and Harnedy are in good form, but they still have question marks over key positions. It'll be close, but Tipp at home should do it.



I don't know about us against Galway, I don't think Galway are brilliant, but we'll still have to improve a huge amount.

francozola

Was talking to a Clare man this morning and we discussed how much different it would be if Limerick had beaten Clare & then Cork in the All Ireland series.
18 months ago and even 12 months ago, many Clare & Limerick people along with pundits would have said our team was further "down the road" in terms of development.

The teams in 2012 lined out as following
Clare: P Kelly; D O'Donovan, C Dillon, S Morey; B Bugler, P Donnellan, N O'Connell; C Galvin, S Collins; F Lynch, J Conlon, T Kelly; A Cunningham, C McGrath, D Honan.

Limerick: N Quaid; S Walsh, R McCarthy, T Condon; W McNamara, D O'Grady, G O'Mahony; J Ryan, P O'Brien; S Dowling, B Geary, D Breen; G Mulcahy, N Moran, S Tobin

And again in 2013
Clare: P Kelly; D O’Donovan, D McInerney, C Dillon; B Bugler, P Donnellan, P O’Connor; C Galvin, C Ryan; J Conlon, T Kelly, C Ryan; P Collins, D Honan, C McGrath.

Limerick: N Quaid; S Walsh, R McCarthy, T Condon; P O’Brien, W McNamara, G O’Mahony; P Browne, D O’Grady; D Breen, J Ryan, S Hickey; G Mulcahy, D Hannon, S Tobin

Not much has changed in either side but I feel Clare's management have found solutions to the spine of the team (McInerney, Conor Ryan, Podge Collins). We are still weak down the centre at centre back & centre forward, full forward especially. We still have time and hopefully solutions can be found.
Clare have gotten unreal confidence from the All Ireland victory, we seemed to have had our confidence dented from our Croke Park experience. Indeed one of JBMs selectors said as much for Cork last week. Therefore, I'm going to trust in the management to find solutions and hope the players find themselves before Championship.

Anyway for Sunday, perhaps one solution will be to play a double centre back if JC is playing for Galway. Something along the lines
Quaid
Dempsey, McCarthy, Walsh
Paudie, Wayne, Gavin (if fit)
Condon
O'Grady, Browne
Hannon(if fit)/Tobin/T.Ryan, Ryan, Allis/Dowling
Downes, Mulcahy

My reason for Condon out that far is that he is a good reader of the game, lightning quick can cover the ground but most importantly he is very intelligent on the ball.
I don't like the idea of sacrificing a forward to play as a third man midfielder, as it usually is one of the smaller guys.

Fireball07

Not that many changes from that Clare team... but the ones they did make are significant.

Morey is a great player but not a great corner-back, McInerney is a much better man-marker.

Pat O'Connor is a much better wing-back than Nicky O'Connell, and Conor Ryan adds an option as a ball-winning centre-back that they didn't always have.

The most significant changes though were dropping Tony Kelly back to midfield where he can run riot, and bringing Podge Collins into the team as a playmaker in a free role, and he is pure class, he makes things happen.

I don't think O'Connell, Lynch, Sean Collins and Cunnningham are as good as O'Connor, Colin and Conor Ryan, and Podge.






As for the weekend, I don't think there's any need for us to go with double centre-backs really, unless we're really worried about plugging a hole. I think Canning will start at midfield. What I would like to see is to move Jim Bob from centre-forward...... reason being, Iarla Tannian has comfortably dealt with the physical centre-forwards but has struggled hugely with the pacy, direct ones such as Richie Hogan and Pauric Mahony. He's good at winning the physical battles but if you run at him, and move around a lot, he's not the best at dealing with that. So, I'd love to see a roaming centre-forward. Mulcahy would be the ideal man to expose Tannian but I can't see him starting at centre-forward, so I'd like to see Downes, who will take him on if he gets the ball.


And we tend to play with 3 midfielders most of the time anyway, except it's often Mulcahy who comes out the field. I'd rather just name a proper midfielder there, and leave 2 men inside. Dowling has to start, I hope Hannon is fit too. Would seriously consider Mulcahy in a Podge Collins-esque role at centre-forward for this game.

Would start Murphy in goal, Dempsey at corner-back, Tom Ryan if Gavin isn't fit.

francozola

Morey was in corner back to man mark Graeme. If memory serves me correctly, he wasn't named at corner back for that match versus Limerick in 12.

I dunno will Galway want to win, with them already facing KK in the Leinster semi final.

Fireball07

francozola wrote: »

Morey was in corner back to man mark Graeme. If memory serves me correctly, he wasn't named at corner back for that match versus Limerick in 12.

I dunno will Galway want to win, with them already facing KK in the Leinster semi final.

They're hardly going to throw it... I imagine they'll see Limerick as a good test and see how a few of their lads go in a knockout situation- the Burkes, Brehony, Flynn, McInerney, etc.

Fireball07

Was at the Scór quiz in Claghaun last night. Got well-beaten in the end, Monaleen got a fairly phenomenal score, were winners by a mile. We threw away some easy enough marks... it's not very well-advertised though. I'd say it's the kind of one you'd do very well in after a couple of years, and getting used to the format of the questions.



And adult tickets for the Limerick-Galway quarter-final are only €15 if you buy them in advance. Let's see if Limerick can rustle up a big home attendance for a big home quarter-final. Would we actually bring in a big crowd if we were in 1A, now's the time to show that we could- the likes of KK, Clare, Waterford have all had very impressive home crowds for the league.

HandsomeRover

Hannon done his groin again. Not sure how bad it is, enough to keep him out for the weekend anyway.

Galway will win this I think. They seem to be way ahead of us in terms of fitness, organisation and speed/intensity of play. With Joe canning back, they should have too much for our short passing / third midfielder (GM) /poor finishing / predictable style.

I fear a reality check is on the cards. Sincerely hope I have it arseways!

francozola

If that is true Handsome, management have a lot to answer for. Seems like the player was rushed back for a league game since all we heard that he would miss all the league.
Seems like JC is a doubt for Sunday but as you say hard to see where all of a sudden we hit the ground running, get everything right and beat Galway.

glasagusban

francozola wrote: »

If that is true Handsome, management have a lot to answer for. Seems like the player was rushed back for a league game since all we heard that he would miss all the league.
Seems like JC is a doubt for Sunday but as you say hard to see where all of a sudden we hit the ground running, get everything right and beat Galway.

Hard to say with a thing like that. Surely they were following the advice of the physio as to whether he was ok to go out on the pitch or not. They only have him two mins when the game looked safe so I presume it was just to get him out on the pitch again. However two of our main players did play a league game a week after I heard that both were in serious discomfort with injuries, I was really surprised to see both line out.

Pandiani

Hannon has a groin injury,the injury that was keeping him out up till now was an ankle problem so struggling to see why the management would have a lot to answer for here as there is no evidence that they have rushed him back.

glasagusban

Pandiani wrote: »

Hannon has a groin injury,the injury that was keeping him out up till now was an ankle problem so struggling to see why the management would have a lot to answer for here as there is no evidence that they have rushed him back.

Correct. Wasn't it a groin injury that kept him out two years ago too?

Fireball07

Probably not going to be posting here before the team is named tomorrow night... we've got no Hannon, no Hickey, we're misfiring in many areas and we haven't really tried many new options. However, we may raise our game for a big test in a knockout game, it remains to be seen. We haven't gone full-strength in any game yet... but I don't think it's a weakened team that's hurt us, more the gameplan and the poor execution of it.


I'd start Murphy ahead of Quaid; I'd love to see one of Allis or Mulcahy at centre-forward to expose Tannian; Dowling has to start. I'd go:

Murphy
Dempsey McCarthy Condon
O'Brien Wayne Gavin/King/Ryan
Browne Dodge
J. Ryan Mulcahy Allis
Downes Dowling Tobin

I'd say we're unlikely to see that... if we were, I'd move Dowling and Downes out to half-forward at times, and Mulcahy could drift infield at times. Whoever's at centre-forward would be given a bit of a free role, encouraged to move about and to run directly through the centre if possible. Maybe Downes might even be the best option.

The movement of the inside men has to be top-notch... I'd sometimes worry about leaving two smaller players like Tobin & Mulcahy inside, they can be outmuscled easily enough, so would have to be constantly running into space. However, if you go with Dowling, he gives a bit of a physical presence but mightn't have the same mobility in terms of running into space, the ball would have to be very accurate either in front of him, or directly into his hand.

If Gavin is out, I'd like to see the physicality of Ryan or the pace of King given a go, possibly even King at corner-back with Dempsey on the wing. At this stage, with no Hickey, there isn't much alternative to Wayne at centre-back and it's not going to be tried against Galway anyway.

HandsomeRover

V Galway

Quaid
King
O'Loughlin
Condon

O'Brien
McNamara
O'Mahoney

Browne
O'Grady

Downes
Ryan
Reidy

Mulcahy
Dowling
Allis

paddy no 11

Would prefer Dempsey to king but glad to see rotation at least - good

Downes and dowling in the right lines - good

Allis will move out so we're already set up for a 3rd midfielder - good

Would prefer tomas ryan as an out an out 3rd midfielder though rather than having jimbob or reidy coming deep.

Who's our second choice CB?

francozola

Don't know what to make of the subs:
16. Aaron Murphy (Hospital/Herbertstown), 17. Stephen Walsh (Glenroe), 18. Mark Carmody (Patrickswell), 19. Richie McCarthy (Blackrock), 20. Dan Morrissey (Ahane), 21. Alan Dempsey (Na Piarsaigh), 22. Thomas Ryan (South Liberties), 23. Michael Ryan (Doon). 24. William Hickey (South Liberties), 25. Thomas O Brien (Patrickswell) and 26. Tommy Quaid (Effin).

Doesn't seem to be much of a forward threat to be had.
Is Tobin injured, surely a better option than Ryan/Quaid to be on the subs.

Is Richie Mc no longer flavour of the month?

Pretty clear we will line up with Allis as a third man midfielder. Who knows they may surprise us all and go a two man full forward line of Downes and Dowling, bring out Mulcahy at half forward and have Allis roam.

One thing we need is 99-100% accuracy from free taking.

thinkstoomuch1

I Would expect allis drops to half forward,o grady plays sweeper between half back and midfield ,clare role,and ryan at midfield filling in for o grady as o grady hasnt legs to play 8 but great sweeping role.


Yere team taking shape,very impressed with team ,hannon to replace reidy when fit and hickey at half back for wayne mac and riche at 3 ,o grady refining system every game yere taking shape .Wouldnt worry re laois game,heads wouldnt be up for it after knowing promotion was out of yere hands.

I think ye will beat galway .