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Loughgiel is by far the best playing surface!
End of debate?!
Dunloy is also a credit to them.

Cushendall slopes sideways.

The down pitches also have fine surfaces altho I loved portaferry's old pitch! Not the surface - but a great setting!

mind going to portaferrys old pitch for games with my dad, was a family day out! picnic packed and sat on that hill, great atmosphere as well in it!

also like ballycastles old field was great to play at. ive never played at the new one but for some reason i dont like it. probably cause we dont win much at it! lol

as others have said lgiel is hard to beat. great to watch a game from it as well on either side (ive never been on the terrace tho! enemy ground! lol)

ok a best pitch you have played on debate following on from the last post! lol

for me either loughgiel or cushendall. good and tight and always great surfaces to play on with the crowd right on top of you.

least fav? portaferrys old pitch, never liked it. though their new pitch is brilliant!

were back again on the 10th at home to Ballycastle then away to Glenariffe. was supposed to be a home game but we changed it as they have a festival on that weekend.

Not a bad result for us despite losing. We played well minus shorty and woody. Also Oran Quinn, Kevin marring and séan dowds injured so were short a few. Nigel Elliott came off early with a knee injury and we also lost young Adam O'kane in corner back to a broken collar bone. Despite all that plus a ref who was utterly woefull to us the entire game we played pretty well.

Nei in midfield? Ffs he's been great at centre half. I assume mattys injury from tr u21 final has him rules out but play Neil in the middle where he could field a ball. Doesn't make sense.
Full forward line looks weak other than Karl.
I have hope that we can win but the head says lose sadly
I really want to be wrong.

[Also, thought the ref Owen Elliott was very good,]

Bate by the Crans last night in what was a pretty decent game where they bagged a goal in injury time to take the points.

I think it ended up 4-10 to 3-16 or similar

Considering the team we put out I was expecting worse and to be fair Ballycran were all over us in the first half and should have been 7 or 8 up rather than the 2 they went in with. They got a good goal and a few points early on and were cutting through our defence at will it seemed, but we got two goals to keep us in the game. As our defence was probably missing two of our better defenders through injury it wasn't entirely unexpected.
A few changes at half time in moving a few lads about seemed to have worked, we got another two goals to take a lead with both teams pinning on points till it was all level. The winning goal was at the death and as much as it pains me to say it probably deserved, but we'll not be too despondent if we meet them later on in the year on a big pitch with a full compliment.

Also, thought the ref Owen Elliott was very good, let it go a bit and when lads were going down a bit easy made them play on. No real nastiness in the game also helped to make it an entertaining game.

Yeah I've never had any complaints about Owen, even when I managed our seniors I always thought he was fair and let the game go (within reason)

That's a fair scoring game Johnney, the Down hurlers have puit in some miles lately, I'm sure they could do with a rest

Id say if you asked DR he might have a different opinion on this one, maybe nothing too bad but maybe a question or two for him?

lol yeah one or two possibly! Naw I like him personally, he has his bad moments, like any ref does but on the whole he isn't that bad.
I've just felt we have come on the wrong end of calls a couple I times from him.  The quick free one annoyed me as he had no consistency with it and he did admit to getting that one wrong.
He isn't a bad ref but are there any good ones?

IMO Eddie is lgiels best forward. I love watching him play as he can run, pass, shoot and score. He also a nice fella to speak to and someone whom I think has the potential to be even better.

That said when he plays for Antrim he hasn't been good. Against Carlow in the play off he showed what he could do in the second half. I find myself willing him to do what he does for lgiel for Antrim. If he clicks he's a handful for any defender.

Our game at cdall has been called off.

[choice of referee.]

i hope the future brings a senior championship for its what Antrim need, a strong Belfast

one thing I was surprised about was the choice of referee.  It is alright now the Johnnies have won but would they be happy if they got beat and knew the game was refereed by an ex Ballycastle hurler.  Ref did have a good game , terrible conditions but st johns wanted it more and had the better hurlers.  Clarke and Saul never got going

thought the Johnsons were v good and the st Johns number 7 turned a lot of ball

big Donnelly should have got taken off for he was clearly injured and rendered useless, give the subs a chance

also for such a night a good crowd

he refed our game in the feis on Wednesday night. Did a decent job. Did a good job last night. Called it right from a neutral point of view.

Mark is a decent lad and I would have no worries as to the way he would referee a game, a Armoy man, so unsure of the Ballycastle link, and the reasons he would have left. I'm glad to see a Belfast team win, I'm not a Johnnies fan being from Naomh Gall would be a hint. They might even win another one as team is young enough, when was the last Belfast team to win an under 21? we got to a final, beat by Loughgiel and lost one due to some dispute and the final wasn't even played (I think)

Just left the u21 final in injury time. At johns 1-15 ballycastle 1-10.
Johnnies better team in the 2nd half.
Horrible nigjt

Cushendall won it in 1999, I have the medal on the mantle piece

your right. The 98 final was delayed and wasn't played till early 99. Age is getting to me lol! I played in the 2 previous finals as well both v lgiel and lost both. 98 was against lgiel again and we won it.

Was that cdalls first u21 win that year?

Best of luck to our u21's tonight vs St. Johns. Should be two evenly matched teams and hopefully it will be a cracking game.

Championships are not easy won and they are even harder to retain. Loughgiel were the last team to retain the u21 title, in fact they won at least 4 in a row in the early 2000's. Before that I can only remember Dunloy retaining it in the 80's when the competition was in its infancy.

Wouldn't read anything in to last Sunday's league game, for one it wasn't championship and two the u21 players on both teams im sure weren't going at full pelt.

One last thing I hope we are talking about the game and the players performance tomorrow and not the antics of a member of the St Johns management team.

Think we won it about 6 years in a row in the late 80's early 90's.

I rem us last retaining it in 99 (I played that one) and maybe 00 against St. Paul's over in lgiel?  Cdall won it the following year against us? Maybe I'm wrong on that one.

Is there any list of the winners of the competition?

Or until you paid your public liability insurance lol

Bit of a hash that one but I hear its all sorted now. Did get a laugh at it tho.

Aye. Croke Pk are very quick to come down on clubs but can't get their own house in order. Agh well, all fully paid up now.

Poor Jackie was getting the blame for it for a while but I heard it was a mess between croke park and and the powers that be.

Still I did get a laugh texting a few lgiel mates asking we're they renaming the club to newco ga&cc lol

On another note, are the league games on Wednesday night going to be played with Antrim playing on the Saturday evening?

Or until you paid your public liability insurance lol

Bit of a hash that one but I hear its all sorted now. Did get a laugh at it tho.

Dunloy Realist, are both Woody and Shorty not injured and this is the reason they didn't play last night?

shorty is injured and wouldn't have played regardless a he would went to the county. Woody was taken off as a precaution on Sunday past against Rossa but he went to the county training anyway to watch it.

I know cdall wanted the game off last night maybe due to being weakend with the county boys at training. I can understand that as they are 4 of your main players.

That said without them we prob would list anyway! Lol

Shorty has played 5-7 games in all competitions for our club this season and he's IMO one of the best players in the county at the min. We have had to do without him through county commitments and have still played all our games without cancelling one.