I don’t actually know from the stand it looked like he rolled an ankle or something could have been to do with the pitch
Before blanchfield came off he went down on one knee and was pointing towards groin quad or hamstring area but it could have been his ankle
What's mullens injury?
Looked to me blanchfield was a muscle injury quad or groin maybe
How bad are Adrian Mullen and David Blanchfield is it 2 ankle injuries ?, realistically we are ok until the Leinster final on the 8th of June. Hopefully the 2 lads will be back for that. Pity for Shane Murphy
Looks like we might be missing Shane Murphy, Adrian Mullen, and David Blanchfield for an extended period. Hard to see Shane back this year and other 2 will possibly be under pressure to make later stages of Leinster round robin. TJs injury is a couple of weeks away as well from what I've heard. You'd imagine Stephen Donnelly will get a start Sunday and possibly Tommy Walsh also with rest of team unchanged.
Problem is it leaves us very light on the bench defensively with only Padraic Moylan and Eoin Lyng remaining as options from the last matchday panel, neither of whom have any championship experience. We're another defensive injury away from a bit of a crisis.
Typical Galway, might get a reaction against a young, naive Offaly team. They failed to get out of Leinster last year and Antrim had them in all sorts of trouble before getting a man sent off. Enough about Galway from me now.
A good win at the weekend. IMO i dont think we could ask for more bar no injuries. Hard to know how good this team is as Galway were poor. Injuries will be a major factor for KK in this AI. To have any chance we need to have our main players fit and ready for closing stages of the AI. The team needs to go to Antrim and put in a good performance. Anything else and question marks will surface.
Regarding Munster v Leiinster its a completely different ball game. You really have to start the Munster Championship well. Losing your first game and your under pressure. You can get away with it in Leinster. If Leinster was as competitive as Munster it would have the same instensity.
Regarding crowds and people criticisng KK people they need to rem we have the smallest Population of any of the top teams. But saying that it needs to be better and the GAA need to get more people through the turnstiles. Kids for free should be the first step.
I think people have been very quick to dance on Galway’s grave
The match was tight enough in the first half save the very soft goal we got
KK started the second half well and opened a gap and the game kind of petered out
it’s not that long ago Galway won the league match against us just as easily
Cathal mannion would walk onto any team in Ireland and they have other top class players like Conor whelan - maybe not enough of them - but if we met again, I wouldn’t expect much between the teams and I think there’s definitely a kick left in them this year
Exactly. In the round-robin match in Salthill in 2018, Galway dismissed Kilkenny easily enough, but could only scrape a draw in the subsequent Leinster final. Things can change quickly enough. There was a 6/7 year spell post 2015 Leinster final when Galway lost no championship match by more than 4 points, not the sign of a team downing tools. Things have been tougher the past couple of seasons and last weekend was a bad low; however, it was Donohoe's first championship game back in charge and I have faith he will restore better fortunes to the team. Criticism applied to Galway last Saturday could just as validly be levelled at Cork, who really switched off after ht on Sunday, or even Tipp' who have done next to nothing since 2019.
I think the criticism of that Galway team/period in general terms is a bit unjustified. The 2017 team was a mature team at the time with an evolved base from the 2012-2015 teams that had our generational team in a real bind at the time. In 2017 they hammered the shite out of (physically and hurling wise) Wexford when we were scratching our heads at how to deal with a sweeper. They beat a very strong Tipp team in an epic semi final. Then dealt with the pressure of a final after a number of losses (something we will have to face eventually). Counter intuitively they then under performed in the 2018 final but could still have salvaged a draw after they finally woke up. They won the preceding semi by a point against a really strong Clare team. They had beaten Kilkenny after a replay in the Leinster final but it would be fair to argue that they should have dismissed that Kilkenny team much easier than they did. Maybe the grit that Kilkenny team showed, while clearly in transition (Padraig Walsh marking Johnny Glynn at FB, John Donnelly, Mossey etc making starts) was what we didn't see this week. But I would tend to consider the grit that Kilkenny showed those two days to be remarkable. After that period they then ran into another generational team in Limerick and similar to ourselves banged their heads a lot of times but were generally worn down in the end.
Their record in Leinster is poor since then but Leinster isn't the cake walk that everyone seams to think it and the margins between being squeezed out or losing with the last puck of a game are pretty small. Their performance on Sunday wasn't good but I think that's what should be focussed on - rather than a broader critique.
A couple of Village`s posts will be up on the wall in the Galway dressing room in Tullamore this weekend I reckon.
I didn’t mean you .
There's many reasons why.
4:00pm on an Easter Saturday isn't a great time for a lot of people to be heading to a match. There's virtually no promotion of the sport at all by the Leinster Council, they're hardly going to give two fcuks about a championship if they don't give a damn about the sport, you wouldn't even know the Leinster championship was due to start given the lack of promotion. Both teams were hardly in impressive form in the league either, and Galway have been poor for a few years now, so there was a sense from before the match that it was never going to be a classic.
The home support was minimal was about 7500 out of 8250, not good but not woeful. Galway fans, well why would you travel 200km or whatever to a match you knew you would probably lose on a sh!t day weather wise on a Bank Holiday weekend? They never turned up (and left what little atmosphere there was completely one-sided).
There's about 60/70 stoppages a game in a game of hurling, closer to 80 some days, You're lucky to get 20 seconds of action before a pot-shot, never mind 30. There's no real flow to the sport any more. Hard to get excited over rinse and repeat.
The constant puling and dragging is the only way to counter the constant throwing and steps. No-one uses a regulation hurl. Cheating is rampant, and people get put off by it. It's very hard to watch a game back on the telly these days, but take away a passionate crowd and it becomes very hard to watch live either. Good hurling brings a crowd, and with the way hurling is played these days, it's the crowd that make the game, not the sport itself.
But hurling gets away with it because it's so good that some of the skills are still outrageous, and even the cheating helps in that it provides the sport the ability to be played at breakneck speed, which whatever the merits, appeals.
Munster is particularly good because it's generally close, played at a blistering pace and that whips up the crowd. But slow it down and take the excitement of the crowd out of it, and hurling is a more a cheat-fest with the ball going out of play every 20-25 seconds. It's a poor watch. And there's been enough poor games in Munster to prove that too.
The problem with Leinster hurling is that it has none of the pace, the closeness in quality, and so the crowd won't come.
And it's dear enough these days as well without having to fork out a fair bob for a few weeks on the bounce.
I also think the format works for Munster, but doesn't for Leinster. There's no real jeopardy for the better teams in Leinster (though Wexford have flirted with the drop). Offaly coming up might change that, but they're raw and I wouldn't hold my breath for it.
Leinster should be two groups of 4, three games each. Top team to Leinster SF's, 2nd of each group plays 3rd of opposite group in QF's with losers knocked out. 4th of each group in relegation final. Loser of the two SF's playoff the be the third team from the province into the AI series. You'd have the same number of rounds as well currently have, instead of 1 knockout game there's 7, and a lot more jeopardy in the group phase as well as one bad result and you might be out.
If that were in play next year, I'd imagine we'd see better crowds. Never mind tackling the cheating/lack of flow in the sport.
Galway did not beat Kilkenny in the championship that year. I agree that was an excellent Galway team but to win 1 All Ireland against Waterford in the final will be looked back on as a bad return imo. I look at Munster games and the sheer intensity they bring to the games along with Kilkenny and then we have Galway who just seem to down tools at any chance over the last 5/6 years. They deserve every bit of criticism they receive, the absolute state of them Saturday, completely undermining the Leinster championship like a challenge match, if i was a Galway follower i would be disgusted. Kilkenny are no great shakes themselves but they bring a certain performance every time they wear the jersey in a big championship match and the opposition have to put in a serious performance to outwork and better Kilkenny, Galway do not have the stomach for it or the talent for it from what i have seen. If i was Donaghue i would be making wholesale changed, at least 5-6 players should be dropped. If Kilkenny had a full team and did not lose a few players through injury there could have been 20+ points in it.
Please do point out, because any criticism I've made of Galway players over the years has been professional and balanced, rather than cutting and personal.
Err.. did you mean me or Village?
Ye but he’s a cutting bastard and any time his name is mentioned KICK and BOLOX spring to mind.
What he says was the top tier right now is limerick, Cork, and Clare, with kilkenny, tipp, Waterford, as a second tier, and so on. It wasn't exactly a crazy thing to say and it has nothing to do with how many all Irelands anyone has, it's to do with the teams that he was expecting to be front runners to win the all Ireland. He wasn't singling out kilkenny.
Hopefully that's the last time I have to defend Donal og feckin cusack.
Donal og is a wan**r and has a massive chip on his shoulder towards Kilkenny. It goes back to the time of cork hurlers strike. ‘I have massive respect for Donal Og but I was bulling at the Stepford Wives thing’
The times the ‘Stepford Wives’ of Kilkenny had blazing, personal rivalry with cliquish Cork
https://www.irishexaminer.com/sport/gaa/arid-20103729.html
How can a county top of the Roll of Honour be classed as a second tier team? Granted no AI for a decade but Cork (who I'm assuming he classes as a tier 1 county) haven't won one for two decades!
He did I think it was the analysis after the league final on the Sunday game.
On the kilkenny attendances, it's been that way for a few years. I think it's down to the fact we haven't won an all ireland. People are fed up of going to all irelands and semis and getting beat. It's not the way to support a team but this is kilkenny. There is abit of arrogance in supporters, it's all or nothing I'm afraid to say.
I heard someone say over the weekend that Donal Og Cusack said that Kilkenny were now a second tier hurling team. Did anyone else hear this comment?
well Conor ye I got the capacity wrong the other day I googled it and it said 15,000 I never realised it had that capacity I have been going there for years and I always thought of it as a small ground my humble apologies.
You’re right it was unwarranted….. but you should see what that poster (village)has said about some of his own players over the years.
To be fair to the Galway man, there would be absolute holy war on here if somebody dismissed a year where Kilkenny won the league, leinster and All Ireland as a stroke of fortune.
Whatever about the other points, that was just an unwarranted sneer.
I'd fear the worst for Shane Murphy, that looked bad. Shame because he was hurling well and we needed another option in defence.
Mullens must be ligaments seeing as they strapped him up so hopefully just a 3-4 week injury and be back for last round robin game. He's absolutely crucial. The All Ireland is absolutely wide open. 2 convincing wins to lift the spirits after an indifferent league. Minors looked a very strong and mature side. Hopefully both teams back it up again at the weekend.
Looking back on Saturday all we can really say is that Kilkenny got the job done. Aside from losing Mullen early on Billy Ryan was our best forward in the 1st half. Thankfully we improved in the 2nd half and Cody seemed far more comfortable and in the game out on the half forward line.
Backs in general did well. Kenny found it hard in the 1st half to get into the game. Much better 2nd. Molloy strong throughout.
We should really have scored a lot more as Galway never stepped up at all. But job done.
No real news on the extent of Shane Murphy and mullen. Both players out for a few weeks according to Lyng. Both are vital to us whenever we come up against munster opposition, more than likely at semi final stage provided we keep our heads right.
Munster matches were a level above intensity wise but thats just the nature of the competition there. We need to be ready.
Kilkennys shortcomings are always well discussed here and10 years without an all ireland is well documented in this thread. In the same time we have won 2 leagues and 6 leinster titles and it's very rare maybe aside from carlow last year where I have ever questioned them on work rate or effort. Galway on the other hand underperform and down tools a lot.
Yes Kilkenny have not had the most talented of squads over the last 10 years, we lost a core of great players 10/11 years ago, and the players that were in there prime at that time found it hard without the great players around them with the exception of, Eoin Murphy, Huw Lawlor, TJ and Padraig Walsh. One thing i can say about Kilkenny is that every match they go out in they will bring incredible intensity, make the game as competitive as possible and usually makes for a good spectacle, and a level of consistency that supporters appreciate. As for Galway they continue to disappoint every second match.
So don't start. Whenever you point a finger at someone else, there are more pointing back in your own direction. As stated, no Senior title in a decade, Minor title for 11 years and your U20 title in 2022 was your first since 2008. For a proud (albeit one-code) county there's a lot of lean times there. Did you question your own team's character when you drew with Carlow last year? You led by 9 points at one stage against an equally 'bad' Waterford side in 2020, led by 5 in the latter stages against Clare last year but let both leads slip. Was that softness?
Look in the mirror before pointing out the shortcomings of other counties.
Ennis is around 21000 same as last year for Clare limerick match….attendance called out for that was just under 21000.
