Messages

It is sad as a Meath supporter to see it come to this. Horrendous reappointment of Micky o Dowd last year when he didn't even have a backup team in place. People were slagging off Banty and Eamonn o'Brien but both were well ahead of Mick. Nice guy but almost clueless on the sidelines and seems to have been unable to get a 70 minute performance out of the players.

Sad days but hopefully some good young players coming through. County board need to do the right thing finally and get a good management team in place, Andy McEntee probably the favourite at this stage.

We were leaving at the time but he seemingly followed through on a Cavan player after he scored a point. Unforgivable of course but I could understand how frustrated he would have been.

Well at least it has made up some minds in our household, we try to work our holidays around the schedule and try not to be away for a Meath Dublin game. Not any more.

And next weekend will be based around a visit to Galway than watching that rubbish. I wouldnt even blame Paddy ORourke too much even though it was his 3rd red card in a Meath jersey, himself Keoghan and Eamonn Walace were about all that played up to par in the game and he saved at least two goals.

Meath co board need to bring an end to the farce that is Mick O'Dowd's management of this team.

Horrendous performance, I repeat horrendous performance. Mick O'Dowd is by far the worst manager in the 30 years I have been watching Meath football. Totally clueless, not even any indication on the sideline that he has any clue as to how to see a tide turning.

he started Donnacha Tobin today and persisted with the guy in his first game in I dont know how long when the guy was totally out of it. His direct man contributed to crucial scores in the 2nd half. He has persisted with Lenihan who I dont think has scored in the league so far, he made the mistake of moving G Reilly to midfield again, he persists n playing light players that only handpass the ball on the half back line- no surprise that two got injured, just not u to it physically. It mightnt be MO's fault but the full back was roasted and no attempt to do anything about it, bring back cover by replacing a non performing forward. The list could go on but I wont waste my time.

We reappointed him after more horrendous displays last year, his selectors that were the only reason he got the job in the first place quit and he was reappointed without selectors.

And to think that the Meath purists just wanted rid of Banty beause he wasnt from meath, all they wanted was a Meath man. The arrogance, the lunacy of it all. The mind boggles. Unfortunately I have already booked and paid for my accomodation next weekend. Another repeat of the same mistakes and I promise I wont go to another game under MOD.

Wow,

That was some of the worst cheating I have seen in trying to get another playr sent off. Tiernan McCann really is a disgrace, I dont think any manager would send  a player out to do that.

That said, Tryone were the better team overall today.

Well Mick 'Dowd is being proposed to continue with both Sean Kelly and Trevor Giles departing the scene. in fact if I recall correctly it was having those guys on the team that swung it for Mick in the first place. In fact one of our best performances in the last year was versus Down in the league when Giles was on the sideline.

Mick has said that he wont announce his selectors until he is ratified. In my opinion he does not deserve to be ratified especially considereing that he is not saying who his selectors are going to be. Both Banty and Eamonn O'Brien were got rid of and it is my opinion that we have deteriorated since both of those.

Regarding who will be the next manager, I dont care if it is an outsider or not. Why do people have this fixation about not getting outsiders in? Pete McGrath has done a mighty fine job at Fermanagh and what is important is experience, achievement, nous and passion. We need the best possible person who, at the same time wants the job and is paasionate about it.

If I was given a choice I would give it to Paddy Carr, good experience, played both inside and outside the county and managed inside and outside the county. He did very weell winning an All-Ireland club with kilmacud crokes. I saw the following interview with him on the hoganstand site.

http://www.hoganstand.com/Meath/ArticleForm.aspx?ID=126094

Same ole bullshit, all repeated games we already seen today/last night. About time Rte Realised people want to seen qualifier games not live repeats on TV not 3 Min's highlights which is what we get if we lucky.

It's beyond a joke at this stage

I agree, same with Tyrone Meath. Coverage of that game was pathetic.

Well done Tyrone. A draw would have been a fair result but an incredibly soft penalty after McCann was taken down, complete overcarrying in the lead up to the penalty which was a complete game changer. Two games in a row in which an incorrect referee decision was a game changer  but it shouldnt have mattered against Westmeath and if we had beaten them then we wouldnt have been in Omagh today.

At this stage I dont know what to say about the management of the team. There has been good characteristics shown and finally finally he is starting to play players in their natural positions. But he continues to persevere with bringing on young Joey Wallace. He hasnt freshened up the squad at all since the league when there are players on the panel he has patently no faith in.

However Meath in recent years have ran out the last two management teams with no idea of how to replace them . In hindsight getting rid of Eamonn OBrien was a mistake and Banty was not popular with many in the county. If MOD wants to stay on he needs to prove hat he has addressed some of the issues that were persistently evident this year. I would prefer to see an experienced / proven manager take over but we such a person that is a better option may not be available. Perhaps MOD with GG, Darren Fay or similar.

On page 2 already.

With all the anti Tyrone chat from Meath assholes on here I'm delighted with this draw though would have nearly preferred it in Navan but there will be some atmosphere in Omagh for this one. A big step up from yesterdays damp squib.

The amount of sh*te talked about us being British and the Queen we'll now see how many of them will have the balls to come to Omagh on the 11th night for some of this https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VO0dnkYlL-g

what assholes and anti Tyrone chat? so you also think that we should be in fear going up to Omagh? It seems that you would nearly relish something to happen to your fellow GAA supporters.

i havent been on here for a while, seems that I didn't miss much.. northern bitterness still alive and well.

It's meant to be tongue-in-cheek.
Let's not turn on each other.
We're playing Tyrone in a couple of weeks.
Turn on them instead.

Sorry Jinxy,

I didnt mean to have a swipe at you.

just pretty frustrated that we seem to have become almost permanent also rans at this
stage.

thanks Muppet.

Hope all ok with you.

I'll say one thing, despite all our failings if we had Graham Reilly & Eamonn Wallace fully fit and firing, we'd give most teams (outside top 3) a game for 60 minutes before collapsing in a heap.
Wallace was a joy to watch in the first half, he just ran out of steam in the 2nd half due to a lack of games/training in the last year.

ah come on, were you at the wicklow game, did you not see them walk through us in Navan? same thing in the first half yesterday.

Management should have told players at half time that 1st half was not good enough defensively. who cares if we give teams outside the top 3 a game for 60 mins, is that meant to be a positive??

what a complete an utter embarrassment of a management team and a set of players.

it is steve staunton level of inexperience and incompetence.

we are a county that arrogantly looked for reasons to dump our last manager because he didnt fit the county profile and we have feeefalled since.
Shame on the county board delegates that persisted with Ginnity, Barney and arrogantly dumped Eamonn OBrien and Banty to bring in a nobody with no experience.

Shame on the arrogant Meath supporters that regarded an  outside manager to be beneath them.

Get rid of this management team now and put Boylan in charge for the qualifiers and go back to square one at all levels in the county.

Well done Armagh. Like Hardy I am a bit despondant tonight.

There are so many areas of despondancy that I could be writing for ages. Overall I would agree with much that has been said. We are in a bad place. Not competing at underage level is a surprise considering our population, traditions etc. I am not sure if all the bad press about Meath being physical in the eighties has got to the powers that be but we dont seem to want to develop players with a physical edge to their game anymore.From what I hear the Dubs train it into the players from a young age but we dont seem to develop that side of the game.

I would like to keep MOD on but I have to say that I was shocked to see him bringing Joey Wallace in to that game. That decision alone has seriously dented my faith in him. I also think that we have no defensive system and we dont seem to have any plan B to deal with a team like Armagh who play to a defensive strategy. If Micko stays on then he MUST upgrade his backroom team with someone tha can develop our defensive system

lastly, the Meath support in Croke Park was v poor today. Armagh outshouted us all game and we are just down the road from Croker. Much more excuses for Armagh fans to travel. Best of luck to them the next day.

I'm not too sure of the average age of the Meath team but Armagh have quite a few young players involved and this game is vital for their progress over next year and beyond, a heavy defeat to Meath in Croke Park could set them back but a win there could really give them the confidence to move to the next level...
I'm not too sure how the injuries will have cleared up by next weekend but I'd imagine there won't be too many changes from the last game, I'm led to believe C Rafferty season is over as he apparently needs pins in his hand...

Interesting point about Meath's average age, I reckon the starting team vs Dublin average age is about 25.

Stephen Bray - 34
Eoghan Harrington - 29
Kevin Reilly - 28
Shane O'Rourke - 26
Graham Reilly & Paddy O'Rourke, Dalton McDonagh - 25
Mickey Newman, Andrew Tormey, Donnacha Tobin - 24
Donal Keoghan, Bryan Menton, Damian Carroll - 23
Bryan McMahon - 21
Padraic Harnan - 20

I didnt realise that Stephen Bray was 34! Thought he was 30, maybe 31 max. Those ages dont make good reading for us thinking that we are building for the future. We might need to be running to even stand still.