Donegal GAA Discussion Thread

So Jigger misses out for the U-21s with a hamstring injury. Apparently he wasn't himself on Monday either. I'm afraid this really puts Jim in a bad light in my eyes, for this incident alone.

No matter, Donegal 3-10 Fermanagh 0-06 in Ballybofey in the U -21 Championship. Good win against Fermanagh in the Minor League last night too.

U-21 Semi Finals
Donegal v Armagh/Antrim (two amazing comebacks by Antrim takes Armagh to a replay)
Monaghan v Cavan

Nidgeweasel wrote: »

Bundoran secondary school won an ulster final yesterday. As it's Bundoran I'd imagine it's a lower level, they're not an established school really are they?

Still, good to see another success for a Donegal side.

U-16 Vocational Schools I think. Donegal typically do quite well at Vocational School level (see Carrick in previous years) as far as I know.

But yes, good to see. (Magh Ene is a weird looking name - means 'The Plain of Hospitality' according to parish website).

I think PCC Falcarragh are also in action today - here's the report from their Arthur's Cup (Ulster U-16 Vocational Schools 'A') Final win.

Edit - yes, 1.30 today in Inniskeen against Good Counsel New Ross. All-Ireland Final place at stake.

keane2097 wrote: »

Meant to post this last week but was pretty ill and never got around to it so glad to see it's back to the fore.

Would you not think that for a team, particularly like Donegal where squad depth is an enormous issue, that if a player is good enough to contribute to the senior team then that should be the priority?

I hear it said a lot at all levels that young players should be allowed to focus on their underage competitions but I'm not sure I'm convinced. Would you prefer to win an U21 All Ireland or have one of the young lads win you an Ulster at senior level or even come on with 20 minutes to go and turn an All Ireland semi-final?

Underage titles are grand and all, but to my mind they're totally pointless unless as a part of a conveyor belt to the senior team, if a guy is ready to make a positive contribution to the senior team early then all the better.

Ok, this could take a while, so please bear with me.

Jigger is a talented young player. But, I don't think he is at the level to make a serious impact for the Senior team just yet. His relative value is greater to both his school and the U-21 team.

I would also question the relative value of the Dvision Two of the National Football League vs the U-21 Championship in terms of developing players like Jigger. I'm pretty sure Cavan and Dublin, two teams who have been successful at U-21 level release/rest their U-21s from Senior duty when the Championship is on. I'm open to correction on that point.

Another issue - and we are heading into tinfoil hat territory here, but anyway. If Jim really wanted to introduce an U-21 player who might have influenced the result against Down, he should/could have introduced Ryan McHugh, who is a relatively far more accomplished player than Jigger at this level. But, he left him on the bench thoughout. McHugh scored 1-5 for Kilcar in Division 1 yesterday and is well able to take a point. Jigger, in both games I have seen him so far does not have the composure to take a score. Newry was no place for such inexperience if we really wanted to win the game.

We had Michael Murphy, Colm McFadden and Paddy McBreaty on the pitch at the same time as Jigger in Newry. What exactly was he expected to contribute?

Why Jigger was introduced in Newry but Ryan McHugh was left on the bench is something that is bothering me. I'll say no more on that.

keane2097 wrote: »

I suppose I'm coming at it from a more general POV, i.e. that if a player could go on to contribute more to the senior team by using him in ways that would as a side effect dick around the underage teams then would there be a problem with that.

I understand that in this specific case there's quite possibly more going on.

In general, I believe that teams at all levels be given a fair chance to compete. If they are denied the services of their better/best players this reduces their chance of success. Many lads who play underage might not get a chance at senior level (it's interesting to look back at the 2010 U-21 team in this regard) and they deserve the chance to taste success at U-21 level. The same argument can be made in relation to club football.

Of course, this situation could be helped with appropriate scheduling of fixtures and a better tie in/relationship between U21 and Senior teams, like Kildare had last year with Kieran McGeeney for example. Now, with regard to the first point, that is not an issue specific to Donegal. However, we are not helping ourselves otherwise, having a manager with overseas commitments who is not really in a position to manage the U-21s (although he didn't take charge of them in 2011 either when Celtic was not an issue). Ok, we don't necessarily need a combined management team, but at the very least we need some level of co-operation between the men in charge of both teams. But of course the very obvious elephant in the room is the likely hostile relationship that exists between our Senior and U-21 management teams.

The reality is that Jim McGuinness will likely not be around next year. He's understandably focused on one thing only this year and that's fine I guess. For all I know, he has goals in terms of game time for each player in the squad and his decisions in Newry may reflect these goals. I just wish that there was a more long term focus in general.

One final thing - U-21 success has played a large part in Donegal's two All Ireland wins. In 1992, the team was largely made up of guys who had won All Ireland's in 1982 and 1987. And, the 2012 team got a boost from our U-21 success in 2010, not least Jim McGuinness himself who, in part, used this as a springboard to the senior team job. All throughout the U-21 campaign that year Jim relied heavily on Michael Murphy, a well-established player at senior level.

Ye are spoiled with senior success down in the Kingdom and can afford to dismiss U-21 football but we're not so fortunate up in Donegal! It's debatable, but in my view success at U-21 level has driven our success at senior level. The strategy (or lack thereof) at present is extremely short term in nature and is putting future prospects at risk. Add to that the fact that this crop of U-21s appears to have a decent chance of at least winning an Ulster title.

Looks like the All Ireland Schools 'B' Semi-Final involving St Eunans will be plated in Emyvale this Saturday (29th) at 3.30pm.

K-9 wrote: »

That's a very valid point, we've a terrible record at minor level, the U-21's better. We take Vocational schools seriously because of the strong structure of our schools in that way, so maybe there's cross over between them and the minors? Hard to combine both?

Vocational schools is a very West Ulster thing, colleges much stronger in the East, Derry and Tyrone combine both.

Looking at the teams left in the U-21's, it's very open and there's no Tyrone, Derry or Down for a change!

Aye, the Vocational Schools standard tends to be much lower (or maybe not, Carrick did hang with Eunan's pretty well last weekend). It's interesting to note that Holy Trinity Cookstown (who were Ulster Vocational and All Ireland Champions in 2013) played in the McLarnon and not the Ulster Vocational competition in 2014. At All Ireland level, the Vocational Schools competition is gone now, that's why Eunans and Carrick played off last weekend.

If you listen to the latest Charlie Collins podcast, the lads talk about Schools football. Donegal faces a few challenges - distances and demographics being one (whatever talent there is is spread over too many schools), foreign sports being the other.

It's disappointing that we can't field a team in the McRory but I guess it's better we have some success at McLarnon level rather than constantly struggle at a higher level.

Funnily enough, we beat both Derry and Tyrone at U-21 level last year, which you would think would be good enough to win an Ulster title at underage level. Cavan are the kingpins. Beaten finalists (to ourselves) in 2010, winners in 2011, 2012 and 2013 (I was at the 2013 final and it never really felt like we could win it even if we came back a bit at the end). And judging by last week's result against Tyrone, they are the team to beat again this year.

By all accounts, Fermanagh were awful last week and Donegal weren't terribly impressive despite some great scores by McBrearty. Jigger would definitely add something. I really like Hugh McFadden, but not as a midfielder. Ryan McHugh will be top class at this level this year.

K-9 wrote: »

My point was more we are strong at county Vocational school level, though there's only really 4/5 counties competing at it in Ulster, it's just the way our schools are mostly structured.

Ah, I get you now.

The McRory favours Northern Ireland counties, Monaghan and Cavan have no success in it either in years. It was often cited as a reason for their decline from the 60's on, no college success and nothing that notable at minor, Vocational or U-21 level either. We had a conveyor belt of talent in the 80's with Vocational, minor and U-21 successes.

Sure - but at least Cavan and Monaghan field teams in the McRory. The Cavan team made the semi-final this year and seemed to run Pats Maghera fairly close. Shocked me, but then they did have a good pedigree in bygone times. Cavan U-21s and Monaghan minors have done pretty well lately.

Redsoxfan wrote: »

Sure - but at least Cavan and Monaghan field teams in the McRory. The Cavan team made the semi-final this year and seemed to run Pats Maghera fairly close. Shocked me, but then they did have a good pedigree in bygone times. Cavan U-21s and Monaghan minors have done pretty well lately.

Yeah, but Cavn and Monaghan had little success at Ulster under age level for a long time, seems they finally got their act together. It's great to see them and us competitive regularly again, for a long time it was Tyrone, Derry and Down producing conveyor belts of talent and it was becoming very predictable.

Didn't make the game today unfortunately. Listened in on Highland instead. Sounded like we were pretty sloppy in conceding 3 goals. Good to get back to winning ways and get one step closer to promotion. Let's not rely on other results and beat Armagh next week. We might relegate them while we're at it.

Mackas_view wrote: »

Hopefully not. Would love to see Armagh stayin up, after all the good battles we have had over the years.

You must be joking. I never had any time for Armagh and none of those battles went in our favour. Yes, I'm bitter.

overshoot wrote: »

cant see armagh going down tho unless we somehow win by 15pts, its top 4 v bottom 4 next week, while laois may take down at home, galway will never overhaul the points difference, getting a win in monaghan will be a big enough task for them.

If both Armagh and Galway lose, they will be level on 5 points. In this case, the only way Armagh stay up is if Laois fail to win. Scoring difference only matters when there are more than two teams tied; otherwise, it's head to head.

Anyway, I suspect it will be hard to take much from today's game. It sounded more like Louth were wretched for the first half while we were ok. Christy Toye and Rory Kavanagh seemed to have good games. No idea on his performance, but it's disappointing to see Paddy McBrearty start and not score. Leo McLoone remains at centre back and Neil Gallagher got no game time. We had a good spread of scorers, but by my reckoning, we went around 35 minutes without scoring from play.

Maybe I'm being a slight pessimist but yesterday's game was disappointing to me.

If Louth stayed in the dressing room for the first half, it couldn't have been much easier for us. They (Louth) played as poorly for the first 35 minutes as I've seen any team play for a long time. They crowded their defence which gave us the opportunities to kick some glorious long range points with the aid of a reasonably strong breeze. With their 19 men behind the ball approach, every time they tried to break, they ended up messing around with the ball on the half way line and losing it simply due to having no numbers up front.
Even though Louth didn't show up for the first half and although we did kick a number of impressive points, it was disappointing that we didn't create any goal chances.

The second half is what's really disappointing to me. Louth seemed to change their approach to a more direct, running at us in numbers game and it worked. Although one of their goals was as a result of a shocking short kick out by Durcan, they had numerous opportunities for goal chances simply by running at us in numbers.


On a side note, I've no idea how Ballyshannon can be classed as a county ground. It hasn't changed a bit since I played on it 20'ish odd years ago (btw, we played "uphill" in the first half!) and facilities for spectators are essentially nonexistent.

2moreMinutes wrote: »

Where can a replay be seen today?

It might (I say might because I don't think they show every game from Division Two, and with the hurling also on yesterday, I don't know if they will show Donegal) be on TG4 at 8.30pm tonight.

2moreMinutes wrote: »

Yup, Eoin McHugh apparently came on! We were wondering at the time was this another unknown McHugh off the conveyor belt as we missed seeing him run on!

Eoin McHugh is James' son and a pretty good footabller in his own right. Should be playing for the U-21s on Wednesday.

2moreMinutes wrote: »

Ah hell. We're at the tail end of the league and this is the first I've even thought of TG4 for highlights.

They showed highlights from Laois, Galway and Monaghan games as far as I know. Not sure about Meath or Down.

LilNiall wrote: »

With each passing week I get less confident about the Derry game. Louth were cutting through us at will second half. We seem not to be able to defend since the threat of black cards has come in.

Can understand how Derry are still 50-1 & even 5-1 for the league looks fair. Dublin at 9-4 is a shocking price.

Re Derry

Does anyone recall who won Division One in 2007?
Does anyone remember who their manager was?
Does anyone remember how their Championship went?


There have been some worrying signs in the League, but we still have potentially two big games to go that might show us more. And, look at our league form in each of the last three years. It hasn't been great. Maybe Division Two was a higher standard in 2011 (we finished ahead of Derry, Tyrone and Kildare, none of whom were promoted), but we were far from impressive at times.

I'm hoping to get to Croke Park to see Derry in the Division One Semi-Final. Plenty of time to analyse our chances after the league is finished for both teams.