The Official Cavan GAA Discussion thread.

That was horrendously bad in the second half, We competed admirably in the first half against the wind, and were well in the game until they got their first goal but the second half performance was shocking.

The second half plans seemed to be put a half fit Paddy Lynch on and start taking /2 point shots, Donegal had him surrounded by 3 men everytime he went outside the arc.

James Smith competed admirably but he wasn’t anywhere close to be being fit.

Mc Veety I thought was outstanding throughout, Holla put in a serious shift , and I thought the full back line did well especially Niall Carolan,until the Cavan structures completely collapsed and allowed Donegal to run through us in numbers in the second half..

I though Evan Crowe performed well, he was always an outlet, but he isn’t a midfielder, he does many things very well, tackling ,winning dirty ball etc, but he’s not terribly comfortable carrying the ball and isn’t a threat going forward, I’d much prefer him in at Full Back.

We got obliterated on breaks from both ours and Donegals kick outs, can any of you lads remember a game which we have lost so many breaks, I don’t blame Liam Brady for it either , We have zero ideas and zero tactics for winning breaking ball at midfield, we always seem to be outnumbered… Brady made a couple of outstanding saves as well.

We had a few lads whom couldn’t compete with Donegal’s speed , we have that deficiency unfortunately against the top 6-8 teams which was evident against Tyrone too...

I just don’t know where we are going ,to be honest lads…can’t see us getting anything from Tyrone, we might sneak into a preliminary quarter final,but the first top team we meet, I fear will be another repeat of today.

On another note, I don’t claim to be a diehard ,I’ve been at 5 of the 7 league games and 2/3 championship games this year ,but Jesus lads, we were outnumber by about 4 or 5-1 by Donegal , it seemed to me today, I’ve never seen such a small Cavan crowd for a home championship game which was surprising.

Depressing stuff.

That was a reality check today but we where playing serious All Ireland contenders today and we are nowhere near that level.

I'd love to know what is up wihh McEvoy as it seems he gets the ball and passes it back a lot. That is not what got him on this team is it confidence or instructions.

On a side note when Donegal hit form midway through the second half very few teams could cope with it. Murphys two pointer as good a score you will ever see..

In fairness it was good until right before HT and then turned into a total **** show. The goal conceded after the hooter, when we had possession, was inexcusable. The point before that was also a turnover.

In the second half we risked two players who were clearly not fit. Totally ridiculous stuff. Donegal came out gunning for us and we had no match for it. Hugely disappointing.

Any momentum gained from the Mayo game has now been well and truly wiped out. It remains that the only consistent thing about our county team is their inconsistency.

And the county board are worried about throwing tens of millions into a ground which is far from a fortress and where we are outnumbered by opposition supporters.

Absolutely bang on. Nothing at all wrong with Brefini in its current condition. Far better pumping that money into the underage structures and aiming to be at the top table in the 7 - 10 years. The focus on a redevelopment

If it skews stats it's in our favour. I think donegal got 1 x 2 pointer. We got 2 or maybe 3.

You are right, we are mentally very very weak. I would even go as far to say if Mayo game had gone on 5 mins more we probably would've lost it

It’s nothing new either. Mickey Hannon referenced the infamous 2005 Tyrone replay where they beat us by 21 points in the podcast. The year before in the qualifiers we were level with Derry and didn’t score in extra time, I think they beat us by ten in the end. 2010, Cork annihilated us.

In 2014 you had a good team beaten by Roscommon in the qualifiers 16-5 in Breffni. The 2019 Tyrone game.

I’m sure there are other results, those are the ones come to mind, but Cavan seem to be able to ship a beating like no other county & it seems to be an issue creeping across various generations. You could argue we’ve had poor teams some years but even a bad side can be made hard to beat.

That’s not to mention losing games we really should have seen out (Derry 2016, Tipp 2017).

Work certainly needs to start on this and addressing other issues on the field rather than throwing money into a stadium that our county can’t even fill on a good day.

I'm not making excuses I'm commenting on some of what I saw yesterday. Did you think the ref did well in the first half? Or that Cavan got many lucky breaks of the ball? Or that Donegal weren't impressive in the second half?

Cavan couldn't live with the pace, power, accuracy and physicality of one of the best teams in Ireland and All Ireland contenders. The first half was reasonably competitive but we went in 7 down. We got some chances while it was still a contest early in the second half but accuracy let us down and then Donegal's running game wore us out, heads dropped and we shipped a beating.

Donegal played at a level in the second half that Cavan don't have in them.

Yes ref made some poor calls. We were 3 down and conceded 1-1 in brainless scores coming up to half time - nothing to do with ability or ref. Then at start of 2nd half we missed 4/5 very score able chances, some shockingly poor, and then we basically lay down when Donegal upped it. Donegal lost to Tyrone last week, Langan and Murphy got 15/20 points. They ain't that good in my opinion. I'm tired of making excuses. Our lack of any pre rehearsed kickouts is an embarrassment at this stage. We were bet by 19 points ffs, zero excuses for that.

@mylestheslasher

I'm not going to make an excuse for it, but I don't think that was as bad as say the Dubs last year or Mayo in Castlebar last summer. The final scoreline might say different but hear me out. We were well in the game and coming into half time I was pretty happy. Then we get turned over for a point and still at 4 points down I was more than hopeful that we could compete. The goal totally knocked the stuffing out of us.

You're now up against (in my opinion) the best running side in the country. What do you do? If you don't press up and have a cut you're going to lose by 10 and by pushing up we left acres of space to run into. Naive? Possibly.

Once the second goal went in, I do think we absolutely fell apart. We looked like a kids team that just loses the will to be there when the chips are down, that is concerning.

I am not saying I left Breffni with a spring in my step but after i cooled down a bit it wasn't the "worst ever" (despite the scoreline). Shows that against a really top team you cannot switch off for a second, and that last 2 mins of the first half mean the game was over.

@Cavan_King this was supposed to be a quote of your earlier review but for some reason my boards account is acting up

Spot on in all of that. McGuinness is a dose, but a very clever one. He knew they were in a battle and the cute hooer turned a minor issue into a war cry. I was the far side so I couldn't see it but Hannon reckoned he was almost about to have a go at the officials but realised he can't do that anymore, so engineered a row to avoid a free and in doing so got the crowd up. In fairness the Donegal fans responded.

He had his players ready to run through us, put the foot to the throat and they relished it. Sadly when we kicked some awful wides right at the start, our heads dropped. It's far easier to make a 40 metre lung-busting run when you're 7 or 8 points up, but it's hard to do that when you're 14 or 15 points down. Our heads had completely gone for the last 10 minnutes, and if that was an underage game you'd be asking for mercy :)

Given the intensity of the game and the amount of running Donegal had in them, what was the point in bringing James Smith on for?

I don't think we had anyone who could match him (we never have and most teams don't) but the Gunner was chasing shadows against Murphy. Might have made sense to stick Faulkner on him after about 15 minutes. O'Donnelll was amazing for them, cut us open at will.

I'm not sure about the player buy in bit. A few lads apparently had an issue around lack of game time in challenges, walked and then calmed down and are back. Buy-in can be judged over the last decade. Look at our very best players in that time period- even those who stepped away came back for the love of playing for the county (Clarke, Moynagh, McVeety). Our player retention speaks to the commitment that players have made to playing county level.

Re: management. I don't know the ins and outs but when McGleenan got the job I don't think there was a queue of top managers looking for an interview. Someone can go through the recent recruitment and whilst Ray getting the job was a surprise, again I don't think it was a case of "big names" looking for the role. I always will have a preference for someone from the county managing the side as it will always mean more.

The bigger issue for me is the standard of underage teams over the last ten years. We've fallen off a cliff and you cannot expect us to do much at senior level without that foundation. Not only that, but judging by the annual convention we don't even seem to have a plan to address this. My major fear is a little bit of success at minor level will distract from the fact that the core of our panel are our successful u21 teams and since then……

I think Donegal will win, albeit not at a canter. There's too much at stake for them not to win, and McGuinness would prefer to knock Mayo out now. Same reason I think Armagh will look to finish off Galway. Mayo really struggled to break us down, cannot see their forwards causing Donegal many problems.

Eternal optimist that I am, I think we might push Tyrone close. Don't ask me why! Not based on logic or reasoning…

Was talking to someone yesterday and after the humiliation of Sunday and the prospect of yet another trimming from Tyrone, he said there's no way he was heading to Brewster. He laughed when I said I would tip down from Dublin but my response was "we have to beat them sometime, imagine if it was the game I didn't go to? After all those years?"

It's the hope that kills 😀

I don`t get what all the doom and gloom is here, yer on two points like everyone else.

if Mayo beat Donegal and ye beat Tyrone you would top the group. Even if Donegal win ye would take the second spot. I was at the Donegal v Tyrone game and Tyrone were no great shakes. Donegal were listless on the day and made them look good. They were also poor losing in their own back yard to Mayo. If ye can win midfield, or break even with them then ye have every chance of beating them.

Brewster is only a skip and jump up the road on a Sunday evening, no excuse for real Cavan supporters not to be there.

Our clubs produce plenty good young players every year. For sure it would be nice to see them managed better (for the sake of the lads themselves) at that particular age group for that year, but for the bigger picture of senior IC team's future, I wouldn't be putting too much weight on underage success. Manage properly what you have. Hire a proper IC management team, treat players properly and build a squad on how lads are performing, not on what they did or didn't do at underage years ago.

Cavan's record at underage is just as good as Armagh's, if not better last decade and more. We were at a similar level 6 or 7 years ago in senior but they have built a terrific squad by little improvements year on year. It's an incredibly hard team to beat (even when they were more limited before their AI success) because above all else their work rate is off the scale. And it needs to be because they'll not hold on to the jersey if it's not.

I'll agree we've retained a lot of what were regarded as the best players of the last decade but that's not necessarily a positive. Why wouldn't they hang around when they were guaranteed playing every game. It's buy in from fresh blood is the problem, and what's needed in a healthy squad. And part of the reason they don't hang around is because they don't see it as a level playing field. And I know some will say there's a chasm in quality but that's overstated. If you look at club football there's an even enough spread of quality. And without coming across as too glib or harsh, we had a lot of injuries and fresh faces a few years ago but got promoted to Division 2 regardless. Those lads were dropped like a hot snot as soon as the lads who brought us to Division 4 became available again. And I'm not saying they're not quality players and good servants. They have given us plenty over the years but they are incredibly inconsistent too. Any maybe that's a symptom of not having to worry over the security of their jerseys.