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I dont think we are focused enough on the clubs, as High Fielder says how much of the urban towns are actively engaging in GAA. I have a feeling that apathy reigns across all levels of GAA in Laois, from supporters, players, club officials and county officials. Its nearly too much hassle for clubs and county officials to show some initiative or forward thinking.

I live in Kildare near a rural club that would that would be smaller than most villages in Laois. The club though has a huge connection with the school and it seems every child from junior infants to 6th class is out in training each weekend, there is nobody who is left out. Would there be the same level of involvement for clubs with primary schools in Laois?

https://www.leinsterexpress.ie/news/gaa/1234356/something-has-to-change-urgently-in-laois-gaa.html

Fair play to Conor Ganly in the Leinster Express

We need more of this from our local press

Its about time, the pressure must start from the press. Call out the current county board as they have in the above example, at least get them to have the guts to be more open and indicate what (if any) plan is in place to address this.
The longer we dont hear a peep from the board it just adds to the feeling that they are happy to just carry on, either let Billy continue and let all the ire of the supporters be on him. Or, more likely, appoint another yes man and when that goes south next year they again can sit back safe in the knowledge they are shielded from the continued anger of the county.

This could be a blessing in disguise.
An absolute hammering in front of national cameras at prime time hour for GAA. Its impossible to hide this one, unlike the shocking performances against London this year and Wicklow last which only had a few hardy die hards at it.
What would have been far worse in the long run would have been a "gallant" 7 or 8 point defeat and the powers that be decide to stick with Billy for another year rather than go through the hassle and annoyance of doing work to find a replacement. This is on top of the same lads deciding that everything is hunky dorey in our game and to carry on with our road to nowhere.

Can anyone see us making second in the group? I reckon it would be our only chance to progress further. A trip to Down or Meath will definately be too much for us I think.

Kinda tells you all you need to know when the About page of the County Board section of the Laois GAA website (https://laoisgaa.ie/county-board/about/) is nothing but an empty page. It should be their motto: Laois GAA - just can't be bothered!

Genuine question, is there anyone employed by the county board with respect to strength and conditioning at underage teams? Or is it at the whim of whatever manager we bring in each year?
There should be something put in place from a very early stage, perhaps 14/15 years to get these lads started on the required level because at the moment we seem to be miles behind most teams in this area.
Managers and their coaches (and any related fitness coaches) come and go on a bi-yearly basis to be replaced it seems by yet another journeyman and his backroom staff. Something like fitness, strength and conditioning shouldn't change with a manager and is something that should be handled by the county board.

Lets be brutally honest, there is no surprise here. I was hoping we would keep them to 20 points so whats another 7 on top of that.
We have been conceding multiple goals to the likes of London, Carlow and Leitrim all year in division 4, but also scoring well so I fully expected us to score a few but the possibility was there for Dublin to hit us for 6 or 7 goals. They easily could have in the second half but you could see they were rather mercifully willing to take their points rather than go through that extra phase to find the free runner to find the net.

There are numerous things that are wrong within the county that would not have been fixed for yesterday, such as improved strength and conditioning and a panel of better and more skillful players. These are all seeds that would have started at primary school level up through underage, and there has been many discussion about it on other threads so will leave it for now.

The one thing that might have made a difference (and absolutely would have made in division 4 and will make in the Tailteann Cup) is an actual game plan. We seemed to go 15 on 15 versus one of the best teams in the country in the first half, surely you would do total damage limitation for the first period. Bring 1 if not two lads back to clog the path to goal, with the aim of at least keeping them away from the nets. Then in the second half you could switch to a more adventurous play, but only after making sure the house was in order.

There was also zero pattern or plan to our forwards who all seemed to play their own game. Numerous times the ball was hit in to O'Carroll who did well to claim the ball but there was literally no one around him. The plan should have been as soon as it looked like he would have claimed it, have Barry make a darting run to him in support, or past him to receive the through ball. Same with Lowry, although our first goal was as a result of one of the few times the forwards worked in tandem.

I wont lie it was nice to hear the Laois chant going up briefly once we got the two goals, there did seem to be a good number of us there! I am looking forward to the TC as its against teams at our level, get a win the first game then who knows where we'll end up in it.

The 2-8 conceded tells its own story. We have let in 2 goals in 4 of our last 5 games against Division 4 opposition, if those teams can cut through us so easily then Lord knows what a division 3 team will do, let alone a division 1 or 2 team.
Its obvious that Billy is not up to it, pretty sure any coach worth his salt would get a tune out of his players at this level, and at least have them competitive against the Westmeath's, Limerick's and Antrim's of this world in division 3. He's had 2 years to implement some semblance of a plan, is there one actually evident? Definitely no defensive plan anyways.

On a greater scheme of things are we coaching players correctly at an underage (or even down to primary school) level? Are we coaching defenders to actually defend or is it basically all just hand pass it up and down the pitch for 60 mins. Until we get the structure right it doesn't really matter who we have in charge of the seniors, they will always have a ceiling of the third tier.

I thought we play the winner of the Galway - Clare game first. That means that the final game isn't a dead rubber I believe

I wasn't at the game but how did we set up tactically? If Cheddar decided to go out and play a very defensive sweeper based system against Westmeath then we were doomed from the start.

Laois Rising, thats kinda what I was wondering with my above point in relation to coaching at schools and underage level.
I dont think we are coaching defenders to be actual defenders, the art of sticking to guys, tackling etc. Then of course by the time they get to minor or under 20 they dont have the basics at all.

Billy has to take some of the blame here. Regardless of the quality of the players at his disposal he can still get them organised, motivated and be playing to some semblance of a game plan. At the moment we're not any of those things.

As High Fielder said though it's pointless changing him, the real issues are elsewhere in the county. We might aswell keep him on as what is really the point of changing at this stage.
Simple fact of the matter is our coaching at underage and schools level is not good enough.
Is this because of quality of coaches available? Not enough of them? Is it because clubs are struggling for numbers at school and underage level?
How many kids in primary schools around the county are actively involved with their local GAA club?

Basic enough questions but are the lads in the county board even bothering their hole to ask them? Until the powers that be (or someone new that is placed there) acknowledge the problems in our county, these results are going to be the norm whoever is the manager.

Jesus we have hit a new low. As bad as getting taught a lesson by Longford is we are now beat out the gate at half time by Wicklow.

Who have you heard PortlaoiseKid?

I'd say the more important jobs will be the minor and u20. We need to stay competitive, bring through competitive teams with players full of pace and power. You look at Mayo and they aren't the best or most skillful players but are incredible athletes. They have a good pathway for underage teams that includes a senior development panel so ensures players get proper S&C

I certainly dont know  who is getting it but seems all the stories around point to a manager close to home...

On a different topic PK, do you think that the town of Portlaoise needs a second club or do you think Portlaoise GFC are taking full advantage of the big population in the town?

It all depends what a second club in town means. I believe there is no appetite in town for a second club if that means splitting our club in two,the notion of splitting our club is horrific to me as a Portlaoise club man.If a second club wants to form (just like Kilminchy a few years back ) then absolutely work away IMO, but to split our club  would be wrong and would solve nothing from a Laois point of view. Portlaoise do quite well with players and if a player is good enough and wants to put in the effort they will 100% get their chance to play senior. I cant name one player who didn't get their chance to prove themselves at senior if they were good enough and willing to put the effort in to be a senior player.

To answer your second question we are doing the best we can and that literally is all we can do ATM with the resources at hand.It is a battle though to get kids to play but we do fairly well in that regard.

I meant to get back to you on this PK, it seems from what you are saying that there doesnt seem to be huge numbers as regards kids coming to the club? Is that the case?
I've been living away from the county for a good few years but generally what is the uptake of kids from primary schools for clubs around the county?

I live near a rural club and there is a massive connection with the local primary school. They have training sessions (well if you can call them that!) for junior infants, senior infants all the way up to 6th class. And most of these sessions have 90% of those kids in primary school at them, its a fantastic effort that literally sees no potential player go to waste. At the younger ages its nearly just a big run around session with not a whole lot of ball work but it gets that love and enjoyment of being in the club instilled in them at a really young age.

It obviously takes loads of work, and there are a large number of volunteers but the rewards to the club are now bearing fruit as their underage teams are one of the best in the county.

Did Quirke's record ever warrant this job?

This is not about Quirke or his record prior to taking the Laois job. This is about or own failure. Quirke put his finger on the problem in his post match interview. He asked the question, how many of our schools are playing at A level in the schools championship? He says that these schools should be producing players that feed into our development, minor, under 20s and senior panels. The problem is down to poor coaching at under age level. Until that is resolved we will continue to sink.

We have failed to win a match this year. However, I was pleased with the anger and passion that Quirke showed in his post match interview. I beleive Quirke was involved in the development set up in Kerry. Someone like him should be employed by the County Board to set oversee an overhaul of the coaching set up in the county.

I totally agree that the root of the problem is the county board, they should be pushing to have the underage development set up for schools around the county. Which is something they are clearly not doing at all at the moment. This is on top of neglecting the issues with the dead rubber of the county championships.
But there is no way that for me that Quirke comes out of this without blame. For two years we have been in a league with more or less teams at our level, but we have been woefully underprepared in all of them. The team always seems utterly gassed by half time, as soon as points go on the board for the other team the heads tend to drop. These are easily things a competent coach could address, but in 2 years Quirke has not.
If anything we were massively lucky in the championship last year due to it being just a knockout. We lost to Dublin as everyone else does and that was us then. If there was a qualifier I could easily see us getting beaten by a div3 or div4 team.
If he did complain about the schools not playing at a high enough level then it just really to me seems like he's spoofing. Its a valid concern of course, but he wouldnt see any benefit to this now in his term. He has to come in and manage with what he is got, which as town says im sure he was aware of when he signed up.