Meath GAA discussion thread

snowgal

Just on route at the minute, snow getting heavier as we travel. If anyone hears it's off please post as might not hear!!

Hammer Archer

Nothing on twitter yet. Careful on the roads. Doesn't matter if you're late. Better to get there in one piece.

nice_guy80

turn back. this won't be going ahead

Hammer Archer

nice_guy80 wrote: »

turn back. this won't be going ahead

Officially off. Well thats a waste of petrol

snowgal

Hammer Archer wrote: »

Officially off. Well thats a waste of petrol

Well we're staying up that way for a night anyway so we'll travel on, slowly! Might meet the team on the way back!

iDave

Glad i got too drunk last night to drive

Hammer Archer

I'd expect it to be on the 22nd now. That'll mean 5 games in 5 weeks from Saturday. Not ideal after 4 weeks off.

iDave

Hectic schedule ahead but hoping the cancellation works in our favour. 2 winnable home games to come now. Max points from those and we can then head back to Roscommon with confidence.
Westmeath wont be easy. They now have momentum and 2013 shows they are dark horses in this division. They will be massively buoyed by their away win to Kildare.
Same county in U21 on Wednesday too so hoping for a double over them.

Hammer Archer

Game officially fixed for March 22nd. I'm assuming that the prepaid tickets will still be valid on that day.

Hammer Archer

U21 team named for tomorrow. Hopefully the first of two wins against Westmeath this week. Looks like a strong team, especially in midfield and up front.

Meath U21: Jack Hannigan (Donaghmore Ashbourne), Michael Flood (St Brigids), Gavin McGowan (Ratoath), Liam Ferguson (Gaeil Colmcille), Shane Dowling (St Patricks), Brian Power (Ratoath), Shane McEntee (St Peters Dunboyne), Adam Flanagan (Clonard), Harry Rooney (Skryne), Paraic Harnan (Moynalvey), Ruairi O'Coileain (Navan O'Mahonys), Joey Wallace (Ratoath), Shane Lenehan (Moynalvey), Paddy Kennelly (Dunderry), Eamon Wallace (Ratoath).

Comparing it to the team that played in the 2012 Minor final, there's a few changes.

Robert Burlingham; Ruairí O Coileáin, Brian Power, Shane Gallagher; Declan Smyth, Pádraic Harnan (c), Seamus Lavin; Shane McEntee, Adam Flanagan; Cillian O’Sullivan, Jason Daly, James McEntee; Barry Dardis, Fiachra Ward, Stephan Coogan. SUBS: Patrick Kennelly for Barry Dardis, Harry Rooney for Stephen Coogan, Conor Carton for Declan Smyth, Conor O’Brien for Jason Daly

Meath Centre Forward

Cillian O'Sullivan & James McEntee would probably start if not injured.

Are any of Seamus Lavin, Barry Dardis or Conor Carton out injured at the moment? Lavin is probably Dunboyne's best defender, Dardis any time I've watched him for Summerhill has stood out and Carton was an important player for D/A last year who surprisingly after reaching the county final with a handful of youngsters only have one starter.

It's a well bred team too. Names like Ferguson, McEntee and Harnan - it sounds like a Meath team from a different era!

Hammer Archer

1-10 to 1-8. Sounds like we just about scraped through. Didnt make it so anyone know who played well?

iDave

Even contest so happy to come out it with a win. Especially when Westmeath could of got a goal at the end there.Flanagan used his height well and cleaned up a lot of the high ball. Some excellent fielding. E Wallace covered a lot of ground but his brother was very ineffective.
Too many poor wides throughout for Meath, will need better accuracy if we meet Dublin.
Anyone know why Rooney wasn't on the panel?

Hammer Archer

Only three players scoring is worrying. No idea why Rooney was left out. Hope its not another injury. Doubt it if Gillespie would be ready for Saturday.

Hammer Archer

Eamonn Wallace in for Harry Rooney is the only change from last weekend's announced team. Rooney is obviously injured. Tormey moves to midfield.

Hammer Archer

Hurlers beat Donegal 2-15 to 1-4 in Letterkenny. By the looks of it, the winner of Meath v Down game in Trim on March 22nd will decide who meets Kildare in the final. Annoyingly, that's also the day of the refixed Roscommon v Meath game meaning attendance will be pretty low.

Hammer Archer

Good second half. Ridiculous goal from Biggy. Westmeath must hate the sight of him. Jesus, they played right into our hands in the second half going one on one with Bray and Newman. Every time we went forward we looked like scoring a goal. Connaughton's save from Biggy was phenomenal.

Despite all the goals, I think Conor McGill was MOTM. Never seen someone slot into a full back role so seamlessly as him.

RoyalCelt

Westmeath should have been 6 points at least up at half time. Can't blame meath too much because that was one hell of a wind. Still they will be kicking themselves, they seem to have a mental block against meath in particular Glennon who would be carrying mental baggage from some of the great meath westmeath matches from years ago. Apart from mickey burkes shocking wide there wasn't much more you could do against that wind.

The big positive has to be the 4 goals and we should have had 5 if not for a great save. Good to get 2 wins on the trot but laois next week is crucial. We need to win the home games to ensure promotion and 6 points should do it. We probably only need to win 1 away match if we take laois and cavan at home for promotion. Hon the royal!

iDave

Have to feel for Westmeath. We were there for the taking but they seem to have a mental block about finishing us off. How many wides did they have in the first half? They seemed to clean up in midfield and shut down most of our attacks with a slice of bad luck leading to our first goal.
We hit them for 2 goals early in the second half and the heads dropped.
Not massively impressed by Meath. Scoreline flattered us although thumbs up to Biggie. Carroll and Newman however looked lost at sea. Good to win though. Another 2 points against Leix will set us up nicely.

Rock Lesnar

To be honest westmeath kicked the game away, how many wides did they kick 1st half, must be 10 at least, if not more. Our midfield were very poor, hardly won any kickout, and take away the goals, our forwards were'nt much better.

Again i have to question what the game plan is, we pack the defense, (so much so, that at one stage last night, all we had in westmeaths half, was stephen bray), and break, yet we dont seem able to get up the field quick enough to support.

Like i said before i'm struggling to see any improvement under this management set up, but we are getting wins so i guess thats all that matters at this stage of the year, but we'll need to step it up when the real business starts in the summer.

iDave

Big win for Down today. That makes our visit to Newry even more crucial. We both potentially could have 8 points going into it.

HighKing33

Westmeath really should have gotten more out of that first half. They had the wind behind them but crucially they mopped up the breaking ball at midfield.

Not sure about Harnan at 11, maybe he applies himself more than Carroll. We didn't see enough of our half-back line going forward. McGill ended up playing some of the game at midfield, with Dalton going into the full-back line, Keoghan didn't get forward much so we lacked thrust going forward. Other than that, great display. We could be duking it out with Galway, Down and Roscommon for promotion but we're in a good place right now.

Hammer Archer

Team for tomorrow:

Paddy O'Rourke; Donnacha Tobin, Conor McGill, Mickey Burke; Davy Dalton, Donal Keogan, Brian Power; Bryan Menton, Adam Flanagan; Graham Reilly, Padraic Harnan, Andrew Tormey; Mark O'Sullivan, Stephen Bray, Mickey Newman.

Menton moves to midfield and Mark O'Sullivan comes in for Carroll. Think Carroll has been quite disappointing this season.

Hurling team for Armagh in Trim on Sunday:

Charlie Bird, Cormac Reilly, Shane Brennan, Neill McLoughlin, Keith Keoghan, Damien Healy, Shane Whitty, Eoin Marsh, James Toher, Stephen Morris, Gary Kelly, Alan Douglas, Jack Regan, Padraig Keogh, Willie McGrath.

The minor footballers play Dublin in Parnell Park tomorrow at 12.30pm in the MFL semi final and the minor hurlers play Kerry in Trim at 2.30 in the MHL.

HighKing33

Still think the team is very workmanlike with a lot of natural half-backs operating at midfield. We usually play two men around the forty - hard to know who that will be exactly. Is there any real play-maker as such?

The team is none the less notably more physical than the side that took to the field against Galway. Best of luck to all the Meath teams lining out over the weekend.

Hammer Archer

Minor footballers lose to Dublin 11 points to 10. Lost a three point lead supposedly.
Minor hurlers lost at home to Kerry 7-15 to 7 points.
This weekend is turning out to be a sh!t one sports wise. Please let the senior team improve it a bit.

CrabRevolution

Since Dublin entered 2 teams in the league, was the team Meath played today half a Dublin team? Or are Dublin allowed use all their players for the one team now that their second selection were knocked out?

Al_Coholic

that was an abysmal 2nd half performance but really Meath should have been out of sight in first half,missed chances and poor decision making cost us

Hammer Archer

Absolute joke of a second half. Every single game we have played we've had a period of 20-30 minutes without scoring. I've been a supporter of Micko's for a while but my patience is wearing thin.

Rock Lesnar

Again i find myself questioning the tactics of this management set up, 1st half i taught we were very good, we actually had more then 2 forwards in their half, which meant we attacked in numbers, put direct ball into the full forward line, created problems and scored

2nd half we went back to the usual muck, pull the half forwards back, pack the defense, and starve the full forward line of any ball and any support if it does manage to make it up to them, all it does is invite pressure and laois took full advantage.

In saying all that, we still should have won it, newman and o'sullivan should have buried their goal chances.

mattser

That was desperate stuff. In fact both teams are as bad as each other. There wasn't 10 minutes of decent football in it.

Once again Meath don't know how to win from the front. It has to be a rally at the end with our " Great fighting spirit ", which is wearing thin.

The pick of Leinster will be trailing after the Dubs for the foreseeable future.