*Limerick GAA news/discussion thread*

Rightwing

glasagusban wrote: »

Some of Cian Lynches touches and tricks are just ridiculous. Twice he has struck the ball having thrown it up in such a way it's hard to see how he could strike it, it's like he bends the hurley. Casey really is like another Mulcahy. Morrissey is a class act. Ronan Lynch is rolls Royce.

Galway are very poor, first touch is shocking, but our boys are playing some of the best hurling you will ever see.

glasagusban

Rightwing wrote: »

Galway are very poor, first touch is shocking, but our boys are playing some of the best hurling you will ever see.

Their ff has our full back in trouble. But our mids and forwards have been so dominant they will never get enough ball in to make it tell.

Rightwing

glasagusban wrote: »

Their ff has our full back in trouble. But our mids and forwards have been so dominant they will never get enough ball in to make it tell.

Spot on. Def something that needs to be worked on.

That 1st half was as classy a display of hurling as I've seen.

Rightwing

Rightwing wrote: »

I was hoping waterford would beat KK in the minors, I don't know how they took into the extra time.

I was afraid the seniors would lose last week, but very confident the minors will win, and beat the 2 point handicap. Has to be bet of the weekend.[/QUOTE]

I nailed this one, didn't expect it to be in the bag after 10 mins though.

Our 1st touch is sensational but I hate when a team plays so well in a semi. Galway were as poor as I've seen. We looked a little suspect at the back at times.

If we play to our best in the final, we'll win. No question about that.

donnem33

congrats to yere minor team..fantastic performance. I was hoping we would be able to give ye a bit of a match but we were completely outclassed! best of luck in the final, hope ye win out. i hope i will be there on the day and i will be shouting for ye!!

Fireball07

A lot easier than expected... always hard to know how good Galway will be, but we absolutely massacred them really. Hit full flow pretty much from the start, the forwards had so much space and they were knocking over points for fun.

Morrissey is in superb form, Peter Casey is a livewire, Cian Lynch is being used more as a playmaker around the middle... Ronan Lynch ended up in the forwards for most of the game and broke onto a huge amount of ball. Barry Nash's direct running is a threat for any team, another goal today. Flanagan is a great workhorse and a very intelligent player, did miss a few easy chances.

Hanley had his best game of the year, he was excellent.


Only worry is that we do look to concede goal chances a bit too much.


A very intelligent team, their movement and skill level is very high. But they mix it up too, they go direct into Morrissey/Nash quite a bit, but they have runners offering themselves all the time. And when the game opens up, they are able to find the space.

pat 22

Rightwing wrote: »

Rightwing wrote: »

I was hoping waterford would beat KK in the minors, I don't know how they took into the extra time.

I was afraid the seniors would lose last week, but very confident the minors will win, and beat the 2 point handicap. Has to be bet of the weekend.[/QUOTE]

I nailed this one, didn't expect it to be in the bag after 10 mins though.

Our 1st touch is sensational but I hate when a team plays so well in a semi. Galway were as poor as I've seen. We looked a little suspect at the back at times.

If we play to our best in the final, we'll win. No question about that.

Well done. Didn't see the match but sounds like ye hav an exceptional team. Ye have the title in the bag

Rightwing

pat 22 wrote: »

Rightwing wrote: »

Well done. Didn't see the match but sounds like ye hav an exceptional team. Ye have the title in the bag

KK are better than they looked v Waterford. The 2 best teams are in the final imo. I'd say we'll be favs by about 3 points with the bookies. But I certainly wouldn't be writing them off.

Iecrawfc

pat 22 wrote: »

Rightwing wrote: »

Well done. Didn't see the match but sounds like ye hav an exceptional team. Ye have the title in the bag

Nothing in the bag yet! Final will be a very different game, nerves might be a factor and remember the 2 Kilkenny colleges beat 2 limerick colleges in the schools all ireland semis, in that regard the two teams would be expected to be there in the final, with Kilkenny having the advantage.

glasagusban

What a super performance. Finn, ALTC, Ryan, Lynch, Lynch, Nash, Morrissey and Casey all excellent. And that's probably being unfair to the rest who played well.

Some shakes moments at the back but the dominance from midfield forward, and across the half back line for the most part, more than compensated.

Why the positional switches second half though? By all means bring in some subs but why move players from positions where they are utterly dominating? Management(/manager) trying to justify it's own existence there.

Fireball07

glasagusban wrote: »

What a super performance. Finn, ALTC, Ryan, Lynch, Lynch, Nash, Morrissey and Casey all excellent. And that's probably being unfair to the rest who played well.

Some shakes moments at the back but the dominance from midfield forward, and across the half back line for the most part, more than compensated.

Why the positional switches second half though? By all means bring in some subs but why move players from positions where they are utterly dominating? Management(/manager) trying to justify it's own existence there.

I think it's just the nature of this team, they regularly move players around positions.... It does work to some extent.... Morrissey came out to centre-forward for a while, and caught some great ball, Nash & Lynch both found themselves at full-forward and caused damage.

Cian Lynch was everywhere.... but I'm not sure if that was positional or if that is just how he plays.


KK will be a much bigger test though.

Rightwing

Bookies are after bringing out the minor odds. We're 4/9 favs with a 3 point handicap. Seems about fair to me.

glasagusban

Fireball07 wrote: »

I think it's just the nature of this team, they regularly move players around positions.... It does work to some extent.... Morrissey came out to centre-forward for a while, and caught some great ball, Nash & Lynch both found themselves at full-forward and caused damage.

Cian Lynch was everywhere.... but I'm not sure if that was positional or if that is just how he plays.


KK will be a much bigger test though.

I don't get moving Ronan Lynch in full forward, nonsensical on the basis of how the game was going.

Anyway, won't get that level of space v kk. But the great thing is that even if some forwards are held, most of that forward unit can go to town on you if given an inch. Backs a bit shaky at times in the full back line but you can't expect to dominate every position. Will be a cracker of a match v kk. Really hope they can do it

Some of these players can't grow up a year a or two fast enough.

zombieHanalei

Cork reminding me of us at this stage last year. The Munster champion has a fairly poor record after the 4/5 week lay off against a team that has come through the backdoor.

Rightwing

zombieHanalei wrote: »

Cork reminding me of us at this stage last year. The Munster champion has a fairly poor record after the 4/5 week lay off against a team that has come through the backdoor.

And on the other hand, the beaten munster finalists have won 8 of the last 9 of their Q/Fs

Fireball07

zombieHanalei wrote: »

Cork reminding me of us at this stage last year. The Munster champion has a fairly poor record after the 4/5 week lay off against a team that has come through the backdoor.

The lay-off doesn't help, but I'm not sure it's a good excuse for such a flop of a performance in the past 2 years. KK have generally not had too much trouble.

glasagusban

Fireball07 wrote: »

The lay-off doesn't help, but I'm not sure it's a good excuse for such a flop of a performance in the past 2 years. KK have generally not had too much trouble.

Kk have vast stores of experience that no one else have so it's a different story.

glasagusban

Tipp were good today but I'm not they would have lived with limerick last week, cork definitely not. I hope we take heart rather than disappointment from that.

Fireball07

glasagusban wrote: »

Tipp were good today but I'm not they would have lived with limerick last week, cork definitely not. I hope we take heart rather than disappointment from that.

Yeah... I think we'd have beaten either team on today's performance, but I suppose it's not as easy as that... Cork exposed our weaknesses in the Munster final, while Tipp made sure Cork didn't do the same today.

zombieHanalei

Fireball07 wrote: »

The lay-off doesn't help, but I'm not sure it's a good excuse for such a flop of a performance in the past 2 years. KK have generally not had too much trouble.

I agree! But it seems to happen more often than not that the Munster champion gets 'caught cold' against a team coming in on the back of a run of wins. Kilkenny are well able to deal with the period of inactivity; why can't Munster champions handle it in the same way?

The Munster champion should win their next game more often than not- but for some reason they don't!

Rightwing

If we had beaten KK last week, I think we'd win the AI. Tipp's short puck outs was a dangerous strategy.

glasagusban

Rightwing wrote: »

If we had beaten KK last week, I think we'd win the AI. Tipp's short puck outs was a dangerous strategy.

Maybe. We'll never know. We improved by the time we played kk I think but Tipp's midfield today was a different proposition to the one we dominated. One thing we would had for us is Callinan would not have had the impact he did today of he was being marked by Richie Mc, and I suspect it'll be a similar story when he's marked by JJ in the final.

Anyway, there's reasons to be positive for next year. I think Cian Lynch could well be involved with the seniors next year, and by the following year both Lynch's will be definite starters. A good case for up to a further 5 of this or last years minors to be involved with the panel by 2016. With the right preparation there is a good u21s team in the county for the next few years too. Hopefully the minors go on and win the AI and we can maintain some momentum on into next year with the seniors.

savannahkat

Minors are judged by all Ireland final performances and nothing else. I have seen raging hot favorites being beaten in too many to judge any minor final before the final whistle. More so than senior the occasion can get to a team. It is not to say that many will not go on to play senior but minor finals are terribly unpredictable.

Rightwing

savannahkat wrote: »

Minors are judged by all Ireland final performances and nothing else. I have seen raging hot favorites being beaten in too many to judge any minor final before the final whistle. More so than senior the occasion can get to a team. It is not to say that many will not go on to play senior but minor finals are terribly unpredictable.

Agreed on that, but we're not raging hot favs. 3 points according to the bookies and that's enough to put me off a bet.

Fireball07

Hickey was alright on the Sunday Game tonight, nothing too incisive, but he does speak fairly well.

francozola

Fireball07 wrote: »

Hickey was alright on the Sunday Game tonight, nothing too incisive, but he does speak fairly well.

Yup spoke well.

About the 6 weeks lay off.
Since Limerick beat Munster Champions Waterford in 2007. Only two Munster Champions have won the semi final. Tipp in 2009 and 2011.

This is the third year in a row that the champions have been beaten out the gate in All Ireland Semi Final.

I know Central Council won't go for it as it goes against tradition but there should be something done in regards the lay off between provincial championship and AI semi finals. 6 weeks is too much of a lay off. KK can get away with it as they don't need to play their best hurling until August as Leinster for the most part is a foregone conclusion most years.

I believe if they made the League last longer. (ie. 12 team league begin in March 11 games, no playoffs) The championship structure could be tightened.
What's wrong with playing the similar rounds of provincial championship on the same weekend. For example, you could have a round of Leinster on the Saturday and the corresponding round of Munster played on the Sunday.
If you lose then you're out the following week, if you win you play every three weeks.
It's something that will need to be looked at otherwise teams could see a detraction winning the provincial championship.

Edit: I forgot to mention that there's a lot more emotion and energy spent on winning the Munster than KK have spent on winning many of their Leinster titles.

savannahkat

Rightwing wrote: »

Agreed on that, but we're not raging hot favs. 3 points according to the bookies and that's enough to put me off a bet.

By all means it is worth putting a bet on however before you do the Kilkenny backs are all sound and wont be as easy to score against as Galway. At the other end Kilkenny are very strong at center and full forward which a lot of Limerick posters have identified as maybe Limericks only weaknesses. Our problem may be getting enough ball into them but if we do we will have a really good chance.

grenache

savannahkat wrote: »

By all means it is worth putting a bet on however before you do the Kilkenny backs are all sound and wont be as easy to score against as Galway. At the other end Kilkenny are very strong at center and full forward which a lot of Limerick posters have identified as maybe Limericks only weaknesses. Our problem may be getting enough ball into them but if we do we will have a really good chance.

Full back we are potentially suspect yes, O'Loughlinis alright but not the rock he needs to be. Didn't cover himself in glory for Whelan's first goal. I'd have no issue with La Touche Cosgrave @ 6 however, he is a very steady player who kept Waterford's best forward Patrick Curran quiet in the Munster Final Replay.

Our full back line is our only concern really. I can definitely see KK getting at least a couple of goals there. We're well capable of scoring them at the other end too though if needs be.

Should be a great final.

savannahkat

grenache wrote: »

Full back we are potentially suspect yes, O'Loughlinis alright but not the rock he needs to be. Didn't cover himself in glory for Whelan's first goal. I'd have no issue with La Touche Cosgrave @ 6 however, he is a very steady player who kept Waterford's best forward Patrick Curran quiet in the Munster Final Replay.

Our full back line is our only concern really. I can definitely see KK getting at least a couple of goals there. We're well capable of scoring them at the other end too though if needs be.

Should be a great final.

There is no if. This is a very, very good Kilkenny team. It will take an exceptional team to beat them at this stage.

Rightwing

savannahkat wrote: »

By all means it is worth putting a bet on however before you do the Kilkenny backs are all sound and wont be as easy to score against as Galway. At the other end Kilkenny are very strong at center and full forward which a lot of Limerick posters have identified as maybe Limericks only weaknesses. Our problem may be getting enough ball into them but if we do we will have a really good chance.

I'd fancy LK to win, but the odds are prohibitive. If we get a run on KK we can win it well. That's my reading of it.