Underdogs 2018

OldMrBrennan83

TrueGael wrote: »

Dublin's #1 fan turns up yet again to defend them without being able to debate the facts I listed.............

Maybe when you actually have some facts.

Fann Linn

TrueGael wrote: »

Let me get this straight a group of players thrown together beat a team selected from all over the country - top club players by almost 30 points!!!!!

And we are told there is no need to split the Juggernaut!!!!

As a comparison with a normal county - Kerry lost to the Underdogs as AI Champions in 2004 in front of a bigger and more raucous crowd than tonight

In fairness, I don't think they were all top club players.

cms88

Fann Linn wrote: »

In fairness, I don't think they were all top club players.

Most of them seemed like fellas with notions about themselves

TrueGael

Fann Linn wrote: »

In fairness, I don't think they were all top club players.

A lot of them played Junior Intercounty, apart from a few of the older lads it was clear from the episodes I watched the aim was to trey and get on their county panel

I don't know why they weren't playing a normal county rather than the Blue Behemoth, who have such ridiculous depth they could put out a team of nobodies (who'll never actually play for them) for the first time and win by a ridiculous margin against a team that had been training together for months

Fann Linn

TrueGael wrote: »

A lot of them played Junior Intercounty, apart from a few of the older lads it was clear from the episodes I watched the aim was to trey and get on their county panel

I don't know why they weren't playing a normal county rather than the Blue Behemoth, who have such ridiculous depth they could put out a team of nobodies (who'll never actually play for them) for the first time and win by a ridiculous margin against a team that had been training together for months

These were a group of junior county players who couldn't beat St. Brigids, the Army, UCD,and some other county championship club.

They only had a few players, 2 I think, who could attain the fitness levels of a senior county player. There was a massive gulf in class before a ball was even kicked tonight.

zetecescort

Training together for months is pushing it a bit. Would be amazed if they managed 20 training sessions

rossie1977

TrueGael wrote: »

I don't know why they weren't playing a normal county rather than the Blue Behemoth, who have such ridiculous depth they could put out a team of nobodies (who'll never actually play for them) for the first time and win by a ridiculous margin against a team that had been training together for months

They would get a heavy beating by pretty much every intercounty side at least any of the Division 1 or 2 sides.

Corofin easily best club side in the country right now got beaten by New York so there wasn't much hope of throwing a group of Junior club players together and thinking they could put it up to Dublin who have a crazy panel of players.

threeball

rossie1977 wrote: »

They would get a heavy beating by pretty much every intercounty side at least any of the Division 1 or 2 sides.

Corofin easily best club side in the country right now got beaten by New York so there wasn't much hope of throwing a group of Junior club players together and thinking they could put it up to Dublin who have a crazy panel of players.

In fairness, Corofin went and played New York after being on the piss for a month, getting up at the crack of dawn to catch a plane, went and booked into the hotel, went for grub then played the match. Hardly good preparation.

But it's the likes of Corofin these guys should be playing. Inter county has moved well ahead since donaghy and co took out Kerry. Shur the lad that took the peno is at least a stone overweight. He wouldn't be looked at in an inter county team unless he happened to be a goalie.

Poor_old_gill

The Underdogs lost to an intermediate team from Kerry a few weeks back!

There was absolutely no desire from the general playinh public in Kerry to get involved in the team- I think it’s an idea that prob past it’s sell by date

Dots1982

The producers made a bollocks of it. It was a complete failure. The underdogs didn’t deserve to be on the same pitch as a Dublin representation XV that weren’t even a proper Dublin team and hilariously almost universally qualified to be underdogs themselves.

Promote the idea properly with advertising and social media, engage at least one big sponsor for the show, Start running trials this past month, have regular training sessions, play the game on the first week of December against a guaranteed proper Dublin team. Have a really good foreign group holiday for the panel selected after the match vs Dublin, 5 days if they lose, 10-14 days if they win.

And if they can’t do it this way then just don’t bother at all because that is the only it will work as a concept.

Comic Book Guy

Was the idea/comeback of the show highly marketed from the start?
Like in week 1 the numbers attending trials was small enough, off to a bad start straight away with such a small pool of players to pick from.

salmocab

TrueGael wrote: »

Let me get this straight a group of players thrown together beat a team selected from all over the country - top club players by almost 30 points!!!!!

And we are told there is no need to split the Juggernaut!!!!

As a comparison with a normal county - Kerry lost to the Underdogs as AI Champions in 2004 in front of a bigger and more raucous crowd than tonight

The post right before yours is someone confirming that one of the players doesn’t even play for his own clubs senior team. Top club players my ar5e they were available for a tv show that’s it.

Kerrydude1981

Comic Book Guy wrote: »

Was the idea/comeback of the show highly marketed from the start?
Like in week 1 the numbers attending trials was small enough, off to a bad start straight away with such a small pool of players to pick from.

I dont think it was,like they played Kilcummin in a challenge game,there wasnt one word about it on local media down here

Poor_old_gill

Kerrydude1981 wrote: »

I dont think it was,like they played Kilcummin in a challenge game,there wasnt one word about it on local media down here

And a kilcummin team, without the majority of their east kerry players, beat them.

This season has been a shambles really- there are superb club players out there who haven’t gone near this.

If you picked a squad from tralee town of players who haven’t played senior intercounty- they’d have beaten the underdogs easily.

Utopia Parkway

Poor_old_gill wrote: »

The Underdogs lost to an intermediate team from Kerry a few weeks back!

There was absolutely no desire from the general playinh public in Kerry to get involved in the team- I think it’s an idea that prob past it’s sell by date

The series itself was enjoyable to be fair although they might have to look at what kind of opposition they play in the final game. It has to be good opposition but maybe not Dublin good. Even fringe Dublin squad player good.

Even the senior club All-Ireland winners like Corofin would be way too good for them. Maybe a game against the intermediate or junior club AI winners.

Dots1982

Utopia Parkway wrote: »

Poor_old_gill wrote: »

T


Even the senior club All-Ireland winners like Corofin would be way too good for them. Maybe a game against the intermediate or junior club AI winners.

Two problems; there’d be no tv appeal in a match with no one anyone knows playing. Second; you’d have to change the name of the show.

LoughNeagh2017

I think TG4 should have left out the commentary and had a live stream of the 3 managers talking.

Number 5 Brady was the first male player from his club to play on live TV since the 2006 league and 2007 minor All Ireland final.

Utopia Parkway

Dots1982 wrote: »

Utopia Parkway wrote: »

Two problems; there’d be no tv appeal in a match with no one anyone knows playing. Second; you’d have to change the name of the show.

I think they'd still be underdogs against virtually anyone decent but yeah who would actually go along to watch it apart from their own families and relations.

Boom__Boom

Comic Book Guy wrote: »

Was the idea/comeback of the show highly marketed from the start?
Like in week 1 the numbers attending trials was small enough, off to a bad start straight away with such a small pool of players to pick from.

I think it was poorly enough promoted by TG4 in terms of attracting talent day one. There seemed to be very little in the general GAA media.

I think the timing was a disaster as well - I'd imagine a serious chunk of the lads who heard about it probably looked at the dates it was going to run and thought "that's going to clash with the county championship" so didn't bother applying. Heading off to play with a makey-up team, because you have notions of making the county team, while leaving the club in the lurch, is pretty much a guarantee of getting abuse in every club in the land.

Poor_old_gill wrote: »

And a kilcummin team, without the majority of their east kerry players, beat them.

This season has been a shambles really- there are superb club players out there who haven’t gone near this.

If you picked a squad from tralee town of players who haven’t played senior intercounty- they’d have beaten the underdogs easily.

But just looking at this imaginary Tralee squad - Rahillys were in action up until last weekend, while Stacks and all the St. Brendans lads were playing up until 2 weeks prior to that.

I don't think it's a coincidence that the 2 Kerry lads who were involved were both from clubs whose club championship was finished in May. Dara O'Se knew that Shannon Rangers were going to be long long odds to have any sort of serious county championship involvement and so it proved, losing both their matched by large margins and being finished by the 2nd weekend in September. DJ Murphy started for East Kerry in their first round games against St. Brendans but didn't feature last week in the draw against Dingle. Be interesting to see if he's involved on Sunday. Both of these would have known that the divisional sides weren't going to have the hardest time finding replacements, so they wouldn't be leaving them in the lurch to anything like the same extent you would with a club. They also knew that the odds were high that they would be finished up by the time the clubs were in action aging for the O'Donoghue Cup and the North Kerry Board Cup.

LoughNeagh2017

I only know one player but No.5 has played for his clubs seniors since like 2001 when he was 16, he would be in the top 10 players in the Derry Intermediate league over those years and it is a strong league but maybe that shows how good the other players are.

This club is in the Intermediate league because of population size, they could never survive in senior league because of numbers.

Poor_old_gill

Boom__Boom wrote: »

I think it was poorly enough promoted by TG4 in terms of attracting talent day one. There seemed to be very little in the general GAA media.

I think the timing was a disaster as well - I'd imagine a serious chunk of the lads who heard about it probably looked at the dates it was going to run and thought "that's going to clash with the county championship" so didn't bother applying. Heading off to play with a makey-up team, because you have notions of making the county team, while leaving the club in the lurch, is pretty much a guarantee of getting abuse in every club in the land.



But just looking at this imaginary Tralee squad - Rahillys were in action up until last weekend, while Stacks and all the St. Brendans lads were playing up until 2 weeks prior to that.

I don't think it's a coincidence that the 2 Kerry lads who were involved were both from clubs whose club championship was finished in May. Dara O'Se knew that Shannon Rangers were going to be long long odds to have any sort of serious county championship involvement and so it proved, losing both their matched by large margins and being finished by the 2nd weekend in September. DJ Murphy started for East Kerry in their first round games against St. Brendans but didn't feature last week in the draw against Dingle. Be interesting to see if he's involved on Sunday. Both of these would have known that the divisional sides weren't going to have the hardest time finding replacements, so they wouldn't be leaving them in the lurch to anything like the same extent you would with a club. They also knew that the odds were high that they would be finished up by the time the clubs were in action aging for the O'Donoghue Cup and the North Kerry Board Cup.

I do agree with you on the logistics of it all but I’m just saying that the standard is really really low

djemba djemba

Did the moorefield lad who pulled out of Fridays game play for moorefield today.

klairondavis

djemba djemba wrote: »

Did the moorefield lad who pulled out of Fridays game play for moorefield today.

Lined out at centre back.

cms88

Something i wonder. Did the fellas who were in it think they would make their county team from it?

No disrespect but for example, that lad from Antrim. I'm nit sure if he did play on Friday or, but they're not really overflowing with players so you would think if he was that good he'd be playing with them. Same with the lads from Longoford. While Longford are competitive you would think they'd have anyone worth a shot on the panel already.

salmocab

cms88 wrote: »

Something i wonder. Did the fellas who were in it think they would make their county team from it?

No disrespect but for example, that lad from Antrim. I'm nit sure if he did play on Friday or, but they're not really overflowing with players so you would think if he was that good he'd be playing with them. Same with the lads from Longoford. While Longford are competitive you would think they'd have anyone worth a shot on the panel already.

I didn’t watch any of it apart from a few minutes on Friday night but I’d imagine some thought it would make them better or at least put them in the shop window, some thought it would be a bit of a laugh, some because they wanted to be on TV.
At the end of the day it’s just TV so I can’t think that any of them really thought it was a passage to I/C football.

TCDStudent1

salmocab wrote: »

I didn’t watch any of it apart from a few minutes on Friday night but I’d imagine some thought it would make them better or at least put them in the shop window, some thought it would be a bit of a laugh, some because they wanted to be on TV.
At the end of the day it’s just TV so I can’t think that any of them really thought it was a passage to I/C football.

I suspect that Cooney guy from St. James in Galway may have done it with an eye to getting a chance at I/C level. In one of the early shows, they do a profile on him where he mentions getting beat in an u21 championship match, then getting injured and not having a chance after that. I haven't seen much of James so nothing about him but he gets mentioned now and again over on the Galway thread.

Boom__Boom

It didn't make the list of the 10 most watched programs on TG4 for September, which when you consider some of the stuff that did, is not the best sign.

I wonder will it appear on the October list because of people tuning in for the final.

1. Peil na mBan Beo 2018
2. GAA BEO 2017 – 2018
3. Irish Post Country Music Awards
4. Opry le Daniel 7
5. Rugbaí Beo Pro 14 2018-2019
6. Catch me if you can
7. Cora – The Greatest
8. Finné
9. GAA BEO 2018 – 2019
10. No Country for Old Men

Sterling Archer

It's a great concept, with GAA being so tribal and all the stories of those lads who could have played county, it has an appeal, it does however have issues

1: Irish, Personally even tho I haven't a word of it I understand where TG4 are coming from, however a little more leeway towards accommodating English would help.

2: Dublin seriously, Sure it got bums on seats and an initial drum of excitement but they never stood a chance, why not go for a lower tier County, someone who had less exposure during the year, people will say it'll have less appeal, I think the opposite It there is a more realistic chance for the UD it's easier to market, I understand a lower tier county may not want the possibility of loosing to a team of non-county players

2a: Why not run two camps? Team A and B, and have them play each other, I know hte idea is to get people to actually go to the game but maybe bundle it with anther game or run a hurling series alongside it.

3: Hurling, I think alternating years of hurling - football would create a nice running trend, and give time for a "hunger" to grow for the next years series

The White Feather

Just saw this tweet about the Underdogs and I laughed out loud! :pac::pac:

https://twitter.com/damiencollins8/status/1053375669219065856

Stationmaster

Who did the hurlers play when it was done years ago? I can't remember.