Unpopular GAA opinions you hold

rebel girl 15 wrote: »

I haven't said that footballers are less skilful, but if you count number of skills within the game of hurling and compare it to the number of skills you have to master in football, there is three times as many on the hurling list.

Amprodude wrote: »

Ulster is the hardest province to advance IMHO.

Amprodude wrote: »

Backdoor systems should be done away with. It has ruined the game. Your team is not good enough and defeated your out and thats it just like a boxing match. You are knocked out and adios.

ciarriaithuaidh wrote: »

So you want teams to train for 6 months for 1 game? Makes sense alright. :rolleyes:

Nidgeweasel wrote: »

Canavan was better than the Gooch.

Amprodude wrote: »

50/50. Hard to seperate both.

Hulk Hands wrote: »

I enjoyed reading all those. Ive a few unpopular ones.

1) The '45 and particularly '65 system in GAA is an absolute joke. It's not right that in hurling and to a lesser extent football, the vast majority of deflected wide balls are automatically turned into a score. Every good u-16 free taker can now put over a '65.

An Example: A player solos through and a defender bravely dives across his pointed shot with the hurl and deflects the ball wide. The reward for the defenders skill and bravery for stopping a point for the opposition is a near certain point for the opposition. That is utterly ridiculous and I was delighted when a foreigner recently, upon watching hurling for the first time, came to the same conclusion unprompted.

How to remedy it? Well this suggestion would get laughed out of any pub in rural Ireland, but how about a sideline cut in from the corner flag, similar to soccer? Or even the 21 yard line. Same goes for football.

2) Hurling is an excellent sport and entertaining as hell. No other sport can provide finishes like the one we had Sunday, yet hurling provides them every year. However, it has its flaws no question. It's too easy to score. In no sport should you be able to score from inside your own half regularly. 3/5ths of the frees awarded on the pitch can be scored directly from. That's a ridiculous ratio.

We play both Football And Hurling on the same sized pitch. However, the pitch size is perfectly sized for 15v15 football. Its not perfectly sized for Hurling, as the players can simply hit it too far. Its kind of like Golf where courses must be altered as everyone can now hit it longer. In Hurling, hurls and sliothars are continiously becoming more refined to aid distance and accuracy, yet the size of the pitch remains the same. Something may have to be done to standardise and change hurls.

There is a little to much randomness in hurling. Aimless pucking the ball upfield just looking for distance. Poesssion skirmishes on the ground can 10-20 seconds with multiples players jumping around the same small area trying to gain posession. Who ultimetely gets the ball is somewhat random.

3) This current Dublin football side is the best we've seen in donkeys years and will be remembered as such. Cluxton has always been an excellent goalie, from long before he started the free taking and kick out experiments. He was an excellent shot stopper from the time he was 20 and always competent in the air.

4) Kerry were the team of the 00's without question. The won the most by a mile and its only 3 short games where they were outdone tactically in 2 of them, that is stopping everyone from lauding their greatness. The effort Tyrone had to put in to each AI win meant they were spent the following year.

Two players oft mentioned even on this thread were slightly overrated though. Marc o'se was an excellent footballer but not a 10/10 corner or full back. He simply got compltely roasted on a few occasions (Kelly, Meehan, Brogan once), something which never happned to the very best in history. Daragh o'Se was also a great servant but Cavanagh, McGrane, Walsh and McDermott all got the better of him in big games, a couple to a huge extent.

Seamus Moynihan and Tomas O'Se were the greatest footballers of that side. Cooper was never the very best forward in the country at any stage, but was always in the top 4/5. Therefore he must go down as the best forward in the past 20 years. Bernard Brogan is probably second tbh, though many dont like him.

5) Its scary to think how underrated footballers like Emylyn Mulligan, Declan Browne and even Mattie Forde are/were. The simple fact that they were always up against the oppositions best marker (often double marked) and still always made an impact is crazy.