Tyrone County Football and Hurling

[time ticking away]

What disappoints me the most about the free taking situation is that Harte doesn't seem to be addressing the problem.
I mean we have chopped and changed free takers so much that nobody seems to get a fair run at it and so if you miss one or two the feeling seems to be "Ah let someone else hit the next one".

Morgan seems to hit all the far out ones and so tends to have a poor success rate. It's got to the stage now that we all expect him to miss so when he gets one now we are pleasantly surprised.
Ronan O'Neill looked like the solution early last year but again he missed quite a few when it came to the crunch and his confidence was probably low as he was been easily marked out of games by several defenders around him.

I think the way the game has gone you need to have a reasonably successful free taker as it has become so hard to score from play with the blanket defences in operation and when it comes to the tight matches this could be the difference between winning and losing.

I'd love to see us play the McKenna cup and league with 3 proper full forwards staying in there all the time and the half forward line can come back and sweep when we don't have the ball. With fast players like Mark Bradley & Skeet sitting in at FF wee would have the option to kick long ball in the odd time or at least not be so predictable as we have been the last few years. I fear Mickey won't change it around though and we'll see more of the same as last year.

We generally only have a problem with the long range frees, we don't miss too many important ones from expected ones. O'Neill's free taking was fine when it was in his range but once it went outside he struggled. Look at Monaghan for example, McManus would be regarded as one of the top free takers in the country but you don't seem attempting too many out round the 45 yard line. I don't think we have a solution in our ranks to the long range frees, it should now be about players knowing their range and limitations.

Does any team actually play with 3 inside forwards any more? None of the top sides do anyway. The game has changed, players are quicker and stronger and you simply have to limit the open space in front of your goal or teams will run through you. Lumping the ball into a lad like Bradley who is about 5ft6 into congested areas is madness, there's a reason why the game has gone so cautious and lateral these days, even the much heralded Dublin side play football much the same as the rest these days and have done since Donegal showed what happens when they don't.

None of the serious ones do, but none of the good ones play with 1 inside forward either

[southtyronegael]

ive been talkin to a few people from different clubs and a big issue seems to be confidence draining out of our forwards. heard the killyclogher men had a job rebuildin mark bradleys confidence back up this year and i heard the same from clonoe men regarding mc aliskey. seen ronan o neill play for omagh in the championship and he looks a shadow of himself. mickey harte has ruined a succession of decent forwards.

[Il Bomber Destro]

ive been talkin to a few people from different clubs and a big issue seems to be confidence draining out of our forwards. heard the killyclogher men had a job rebuildin mark bradleys confidence back up this year and i heard the same from clonoe men regarding mc aliskey. seen ronan o neill play for omagh in the championship and he looks a shadow of himself. mickey harte has ruined a succession of decent forwards.

Mickey Harte hasn't ruined anybody.

To date these forwards have failed to consistently show they are good enough. There aren't too many forwards in the modern game like your Bradleys and O'Neills thriving right now, the game has changed and size is a very important aspect to it. Bradley is one of the smallest footballers in the country.

[Dire Ear]

ive been talkin to a few people from different clubs and a big issue seems to be confidence draining out of our forwards. heard the killyclogher men had a job rebuildin mark bradleys confidence back up this year and i heard the same from clonoe men regarding mc aliskey. seen ronan o neill play for omagh in the championship and he looks a shadow of himself. mickey harte has ruined a succession of decent forwards.

Mickey Harte hasn't ruined anybody.

To date these forwards have failed to consistently show they are good enough. There aren't too many forwards in the modern game like your Bradleys and O'Neills thriving right now, the game has changed and size is a very important aspect to it. Bradley is one of the smallest footballers in the country.

I would also be of the opinion that the footballing skill that many Tyrone footballers have, is being drained out of them for the betterment of MH's "system".  This has been happening for years, but when the likes of Coney, O'Neill, McAliskey, McCurry's confidence is literally draining away; something is not right.

[Fuzzman]

I think most of us would agree we were far to defensive minded v Mayo with a lot of our style of play geared towards how we could play should we come up against Dublin. I think Kerry and Donegal were the same focusing more on being defensively set up to beat the Dubs. They want to get used to playing with 13/14 men behind the ball so that when they come up against the Dubs they will frustrate their forwards and are in with a shout at beating them.

In one way I can see merit in that way of playing but in another way it so isolates your own forward line and encourages other teams to play the same way against you as we found this year with Cavan, Donegal and Mayo.

All I'm saying is surely we can manage with 12 behind the ball and keep 3 forwards up front as that keeps the other team guessing will you play a short running game or will you occasionally kick it long.
In doing so it gives our talented yet smaller forwards some support and are not constantly isolated and stripped of the ball any time they do manage to win it. I agree that most of our exciting young forwards are being asked to play virtually on their own ala Colm McFadden a few years ago. Look at how good a player McBrearty can be but their style of play means he is rarely fully utilised. He broke free against Cork this year and did huge damage cos Donegal played with a bit more focus on attack.
It's too easy just to blame Harte for that but it's also too easy to just say none of the big teams play with 3 full forwards any more.

I'd love to see a FF line of Skeet and Lee Brennan or Mark Bradley all staying in around the square feeding off big Sean. Sometimes we run the ball in and other times we can kick it long. At the moment most teams playing us know we will just run with it as Sean won't stay in there. Too predictable.
You rarely saw Dublin, Mayo or even Kerry with only 1 or 2 forwards up front this year. They often used long kick passing as well as keep ball.

[Club boi]

The Ball can move faster than any man. When teams hand pass and go side roads, it allows the opposition time to get back in numbers

Kick er in

[southtyronegael]

i think we should stop worrying about how other teams play and set up our own style and utilise the talents we have. get the best footballers we have in the county playing football they enjoy and the results will come. maybe then other teams will have to worry about how we set up and not the other way round.

[Dire Ear]

i think we should stop worrying about how other teams play and set up our own style and utilise the talents we have. get the best footballers we have in the county playing football they enjoy and the results will come. maybe then other teams will have to worry about how we set up and not the other way round.

I would love this, would be a brave manager-coach-trainer to start it though,  ??

[Fuzzman]

Does anyone on here know how the players themselves feel about the system they play?
Are they happy enough or just too scared to speak out?

[In hiding]

I seen yesterday that Brian Cody has been ratified to manage kilkenny hurlers next year. I still don't understand why mickey harte feels the need to get one and two year extensions to his tenure

[Legoman5]

ive been talkin to a few people from different clubs and a big issue seems to be confidence draining out of our forwards. heard the killyclogher men had a job rebuildin mark bradleys confidence back up this year and i heard the same from clonoe men regarding mc aliskey. seen ronan o neill play for omagh in the championship and he looks a shadow of himself. mickey harte has ruined a succession of decent forwards.

Mickey Harte hasn't ruined anybody.

To date these forwards have failed to consistently show they are good enough. There aren't too many forwards in the modern game like your Bradleys and O'Neills thriving right now, the game has changed and size is a very important aspect to it. Bradley is one of the smallest footballers in the country.

Size important but doesnt have to be essential, look at Mickey Murphy, non exisitant for most of Donegals games sittin in the full forward line, maybe Bradley just not up there to be a top County player??? Although I think he will be if played in the correct position which for me is in the full forward line and with the proper ball played into him.
Id still take a small Peter Canavan over a big strong modern day footballer anyday!!

[southtyronegael]

Does anyone on here know how the players themselves feel about the system they play?
Are they happy enough or just too scared to speak out?

im pretty sure from what i see that our forwards are not happy with the system. certain players like mc crory and mc cann would be happy cause they woudnt be good enough to play any other system. but you will never hear anything from players not bein happy cause they know mickey wouldnt give them a tyrone jersey again.

[redzone]

Tyrone played some brilliant football at times last year, Derry, Cavan donegal at times. Players just didn't perform on the day versus mayo. Maybe with div 1 football this year it will make a big difference. We are not far away. Some people are positive, some negative all the time.

[Il Bomber Destro]

ive been talkin to a few people from different clubs and a big issue seems to be confidence draining out of our forwards. heard the killyclogher men had a job rebuildin mark bradleys confidence back up this year and i heard the same from clonoe men regarding mc aliskey. seen ronan o neill play for omagh in the championship and he looks a shadow of himself. mickey harte has ruined a succession of decent forwards.

Mickey Harte hasn't ruined anybody.

To date these forwards have failed to consistently show they are good enough. There aren't too many forwards in the modern game like your Bradleys and O'Neills thriving right now, the game has changed and size is a very important aspect to it. Bradley is one of the smallest footballers in the country.

Size important but doesnt have to be essential, look at Mickey Murphy, non exisitant for most of Donegals games sittin in the full forward line, maybe Bradley just not up there to be a top County player??? Although I think he will be if played in the correct position which for me is in the full forward line and with the proper ball played into him.
Id still take a small Peter Canavan over a big strong modern day footballer anyday!!

In the modern game size and speed is very important.

Look at Dublin, Kerry and Mayo - Darran O'Sullivan is the only forward who comes to mind there who would be under 5ft11, we have O'Neill, McCurry,  Brennan, Bradley, and McAliskey who would all be under 5ft11. I don't think you can afford to have 3 of these types of lads starting in a forward line in a modern day setting of compact defences. We need a focal point in attack that these lads can play off but I think you can only put two of them in the side at any one time - that's just the way football has gone.

[southtyronegael]

i think we could easily get away with 3 of the smaller forwards on at same time. 2 in the full forward line along with s cavanagh or similiar focal  point and one, possibly r o neill in centre half forward to give some playmaking skill.