Clare GAA Discussion part 2 , No Purple Jumpers Allowed !!

letowski wrote: »

In my own personal opinion, I think its time Clare looked at developing Tony Kelly as an inside forward. I fully understand Kelly is better running onto a ball when he is facing towards the goals, than with his back to goals, and is very good at initiating attacks too. But overall, I think playing him at 11 is having too many adverse impacts on our overall play.

Let me discuss my argument:

When you look at the three most dynamic attacks in hurling right now, Tipp, Cork and Limerick, there is a very clear focus on where they predominantly want attack. It's direct ball into space to the inside forwards. Of course when there is space around midfield to shoot, they can take it on, but mostly they're game plans are about lining up their two most dangerous forwards on the edge of the square (Callinan/McGrath, Gillane/Mulcahy, Horgan/Cadogan sometimes Harnedy) and playing the ball in front of them. There is no confusion in what they are trying to do, it's simple but effective. On top of this, they all are trying to tighten things up around the middle employing grafters (O'Meara/Bonner, Kearney/Meade, Hegarty/Morrisey) to make it a physical battle. It's very hard nowadays for smaller players, particularly players like Kelly, who don't win the ball, or worse, can't carry it through contact/traffic. I think we will continue to see Kelly produce hot and cold performances for Clare so long as other teams keep lining their teams up like this. He gets completely suffocated sometimes. On top of this, Galvin is a guaranteed starter so positions 9, 10 and 12 have to be bigger lads or we will get blown out of it (like last week when Podge played 12).


So last year, when we were at our best our gameplan was quite similar due to John Conlon's outstanding performances at 14. We played the ball, direct, in front of him and Shane O'Donnell and hit very good scores per game. We were at our best versus Waterford this year too when playing like this. Problem is now, JC (and SOD) are just coming off long pre c'ship layoffs and are completely out of form. Furthermore, Clare fans must accept its probably likely JC will never be able to replicate the form he showed in 2018. He may be more suited playing at center forward going forward to help us compete physically and also I think he is struggling with his movement.

I think one of the major problems with this team this year is we don't have a clear focus on how we want to attack, like Tipp/Cork/Limerick or like us in 2018. Do we try to work it out to Duggan/Kelly or do we play it direct into JC/SOD? We are getting caught between the two as our half forward line is possibly our most dangerous line. But I think we are trying to play it more direct, but for example the wing backs (Malone and Fitz along with Cleary) are poor and playing good ball inside compared to Morey/Shanahan last year (Jamie Shanahan is outstanding in this department). Instead what we are getting this year is clueless play from midfield and half back. I think a lack of a clear game plan is killing us.

Overall, for me, if we want to see Kelly play well more consistently, we have two options. Either you keep playing him at 11 (or midfield) and hope he develops into a more physical player, capable of winning his own ball and carrying it through contact. Or you try developing him as an inside forward, make him and JC/SOD your focal point of attack and play the type of ball Patrick Horgan gets for Cork.

I think the latter will help improve our overall play for a start. But I think we should try to just focus on getting back to what we did well last year.