Ulster Colleges

[bennydorano]

If you read my post above there was a 2nd trial the Wednesday after the Hogan, presumably that was the day the Omagh players were invited, dunno if they attended. Up to the school to send 4 of their choosing.

Edit. To clarify: 2x trial days of 60 students per day, then there was a callback stage.

[Estimator]

The three schools that are conspicuous by their absence are from one particular county. Would the county management teams for the age groups involved have restricted the attendance at the trials for those on their respective county panels??

[Milltown Row2]

In the hurling you had to make the cut from the first trial to make the second, I'm sure the football is the same.

I know the first hurling trial was just a few days after St Killians All Ireland win. Maybe they could look at weighting it between performances in games, adjudicated by Ulster Colleges staff, and trial games at the end of the year. Especially when there are UCAS points now involved for the students.

The trials allows for the picking panel to all be together and make judgment collectively rather than trying to cover all the games.

Nothings perfect with regards to picking 'all stars'

Did it affect last years Omagh players? Dates different then I suppose

[thewobbler]

I've said it before and probably on this thread last year.

How they do these things in America is so much cleaner and more accurate.

Every week, each coach nominates players from the opposition for "team of the week". As far as I know they do not have to nominate any, and there's no upper limit to nominations per week in some leagues.

The players with the most nominations at year end become what they call All Americans, and what we call All Stars. Each league/tier has its own awards, and they have "first team" All Americans, and "second team" All Americans per tier when the league is big enough.

To be fair to the yanks - I generally hate how that country is run - they tend to have the most consistent, fair and even sporting structures imaginable. And this is a further example. Of course there'll be personalities, egos and vendettas between some schools/coaches, but it would be a smallminded and soon regretful coach to play this system unfairly, as other schools will notice and black ball them. 

[Nanderson]

I think back when I was in school a school that competed at A level could send 3 players, B level could send 2 players and a C level school could send 1 player