Down Club Hurling & Football

[skat man]

the time for putting in ex players has to be over unless said ex player has coached at underage level alot within their club. look around the county for management teams overachieving with non powert house clubs . the ballyholland minor management teams lately seem to achieve this, carryduff also. not everyones cup of tea but then neither was laverty. whoever is picking peiople for county managment jobs has alot to answer for lately . laverty/mccory cant think of many other sucess stories in the past 10-12 years

[Nanderson]

Performance just wasn't there today. Whether the occasion got to the players or not is a different question. Down lack a real commanding goalkeeper under the high ball and have done for years and no signs of this changing looking at the club keepers currently available and those already on the panel. Hopefully u20's go on to the final of the All Ireland and Down can regroup and go hell for leather at this Tailteann Cup to try and get some silverware at senior football. This game has certainly exposed Downs weakness in the full back line under the high ball and i'd expect all teams playing down will target that. On a positive note i though laverty done a stellar job on Turbitt who was scoring for fun throughout league and last championship game

[5times5times]

Men v boys out there. Look at armagh subs compared to ours.. they brought on established men, with some left on bench, whereas we brought on minors.

[marty34]

Men v boys out there. Look at armagh subs compared to ours.. they brought on established men, with some left on bench, whereas we brought on minors.

Down in a period of development .  Will take a few years.

Stick with it.

[Pocs pints and the gaa]

Too many missed chances early on might have made for a better second half for down. Surely better suited to Tailteann Cup than All Ireland series for development purposes.

Bug bear of mine by Eugene Brannigan wearing different shorts than the rest does my head in.

[downtothecore]

Off course we have to stick with it. Armagh are a seasoned outfit but I think if we keep working at it this setup and  team will get there...

[SHEEDY]

Too many missed chances especially from frees and the goals we conceded were very poor. Poor day all round including the weather. Down are still a work in progress and if everyone sticks together there'll be better days ahead.

[urbangael]

Basic errors really cost us. Armagh got the lucky breaks. Going for points ball drops short a keeper with zero presence and bang it's in the net. Not once but twice! We needed to be taking all our chances so missing scoreable frees and dropping shorts short was criminal. The amount of people that attend Gaa matches purely for a piss up is actually embarrassing. Numerous lads and girls will need to watch the match on Monday to see what actually happened!

[supersub]

Men v boys out there. Look at armagh subs compared to ours.. they brought on established men, with some left on bench, whereas we brought on minors.

This is bullshit. This Down team is in a much better place than it was 12 months ago and will only improve. Whether you want to believe it or not. A poor day at the office, but 4 goals did flatter them.

[Johnnysboys]

[/quote]

This is bullshit. This Down team is in a much better place than it was 12 months ago and will only improve. Whether you want to believe it or not. A poor day at the office, but 4 goals did flatter them.
[/quote]


Let's be honest -
12 months ago we were in division 3
We are still in division 3

12 months ago we were beaten by ten points to end our Ulster championship
We were beaten by ten points today to end our Ulster championship
Improvement or cracks papered over with a few facile results??

The Tailtean cup has a lot of good teams in it - Cavan, Meath, Fermanagh and Antrim will all fancy their chances as will we. Our management need to learn from today - Turbit matchup was spot on but others were a mile off. We lack players in a lot of positions.. I ask - from the successful u20 team two years ago - how many are mainstays on our team? Danny Magill - with cameo runs for Gilmore, Brown and Johnston and Close/Morgan on panel.  At 22 years old - surely we should be getting more through. I haven't counted Murdock/Magill/McCarthy as they are u20 this year too. Will those three and Savage be the only ones coming from that group??

[Lazer]

Basic errors really cost us. Armagh got the lucky breaks. Going for points ball drops short a keeper with zero presence and bang it's in the net. Not once but twice! We needed to be taking all our chances so missing scoreable frees and dropping shorts short was criminal. The amount of people that attend Gaa matches purely for a piss up is actually embarrassing. Numerous lads and girls will need to watch the match on Monday to see what actually happened!

Completely agree with that we actually moved at half time due to the number of people around us who just treated it as piss up! First group of them were really drunk but polite and entertaining but somehow they seemed to attract more not so polite ones...and they had smoke bombs and airhorns so it was too much for us oldies.

As for Downs performance, Armaghs high ball in destroyed them, but let's  not forget Armagh having being playing 1, we are division 3

[downtothecore]

I agree bad result yesterday but we are in a better place and we learned yesterday that that there is a bit of development needed to the squad to compete at this level. I think we will get there with this setup.

[Ed Hardy]

Bad result yesterday, few individual errors made it very difficult and when we had to push forward and chase the game we were always gonna take a hiding. Still think we will give the Tailteann Cup a good rattle. Hopefully have a few u20s back by then (and as All Ireland champions) will give the squad a  good boast. Murdock, Magill and McCarthy would all start, and Savage would be good option off the bench. Maybe see the likes of Tony Morgan get a run aswell.

[ardtole]

I think it was one of those days when anything that could have gone wrong did go wrong. I wouldn't even say the shot selection was poor rather the execution was poor.

Particularly in the 1st half there must have been 6 or 7, more than decent opportunities missed or dropped short from various different players.

There were some lads found our yesterday and I think Laverty will learn a lot from the loss. The Tailtain cup is significant because the winner is guaranteed an All Ireland series slot next year which even getting promotion next year does not guarantee.

After that promotion out of Div 3 next year is paramount if this team is to kick on,  and I think we will. Murdock,  McCarthy, Magill, Savage, possibly Jamie Doran would all strengthen the senior panel coming out of u20s this year.

Mooney, Barry O'Hagan and I vaguely remember reading an article recently where Darren O'Hagan suggested he might be willing to go back after a year out would all strengthen our squad.

I always enjoyed Clones as a venue, but yesterday was horrible, getting soaked to the skin, the access, getting thumped didn't help, I put it down to getting older and less tolerant but it was messy yesterday maybe the late throw in didn't help but I'd much prefer Newry or the Athletic ground as a venue.

[Targetman]

Definitely agree with your comments regarding Clones, was great in the early 90's for us of a certain age but recently its been nothing more than a nightmare when going to support Down, just as well theres no school today cos there'd be a lot of hangovers in the classroom!!