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Any view on the u-20 game today? Any stand outs?

Conor Quinn, Conall Grimes, Antoin Fox all had good games at the back. Ruairi Gormley in midfield had a decent game. In forwards, Mark McKearney got on a tonne of ball, Darragh Canavan very exciting and direct anytime he got on possession. Sean Og McAleer is a very effectveive and capable full forward. Some real promise in this team.

Was at the Clarkes Carmen game yesterday. A good, robust game of football played in the right spirit, very much worth this neutral's£5 admission. Some great kick passing into the full forward line from both teams, great to see them letting the ball in early and not pitting defensive system vs defensive system and laboured fist-passing resulting.
Carmen's old hands still delivering the goods, but some of their young crop stood up well to a very determined Clarkes team. Dungannon look to have their ducks in a row, could cement themselves as a division one team for the foreseeable if they keep it up.

Neutral? Were your own club not playing yesterday....

Surely your own club deserve your support...

They weren't playing at 5pm anyway Boris

Was at the Clarkes Carmen game yesterday. A good, robust game of football played in the right spirit, very much worth this neutral's £5 admission. Some great kick passing into the full forward line from both teams, great to see them letting the ball in early and not pitting defensive system vs defensive system and laboured fist-passing resulting.
Carmen's old hands still delivering the goods, but some of their young crop stood up well to a very determined Clarkes team. Dungannon look to have their ducks in a row, could cement themselves as a division one team for the foreseeable if they keep it up.

Tyrone name the same starting 15 to face All Ireland Champions Dublin in the Allianz NFL game in Croke Park on Sat night.

N. Morgan
P Hampsey
R McNamee
HP McGeary
T McCann
F Burns
B McDonnell
C McShane
R Donnelly
M Donnelly
N Sludden
C Meyler
C McAliskey
P Harte
K McGeary

Saw Ger Cavlan score the most audacious point at Healy Park for Dungannon, won it out in front of defender who was up his arse, turned round to face the defender on the 45, was satationary defender poised for the next move, took a solo in standing position and 2 steps backwards, sent it over the bar outside of the left foot, absolutely no momentum aside from throwing the leg at it, and with the outside of his weaker foot, there was an audible gasp then ripple of applause from everyone, he was slightly off centre too so 45 plus a few yards for the diagonal, plus conditions, savage, obviously not the same sense of occasion as Dooher v Kerry but scores like those live long in the memory

The Dooher point is definitely one that stands out in my memory. Another point I can vividly remember was Stevie O'Neill v the Dubs in the league in the 125 anniversary game at Croker. Was lucky enough to be down that end of the Cusack lower tier and see it from along that line. He was about half a foot inside the endline, scarcely believable how he managed to put it between the posts.
Canavan in the '05 final under the Canal End stand was a remarkable score as well. Honourable mentions to Peter Harte's monster point in the Ulster Final v Donegal a few years ago in Clones, and Raymie Mulgrew sending a Dublin player down the road to the shop with a dummy before landing a peach in the 2007 game under lights.

Intermediate Championship First Round

A   Cookstown   v   Urney
B   Beragh   v   Loughmacrory
C   Moortown   v   Gortin
D   Clogher   v   Greencastle
E   Aghyaran   v   Augher
F   Newtownstewart   v   Pomeroy
G   Galbally   v   Strabane
H   Owen Roes   v   Stewartstown


Intermediate Championship Quarter Finals

Clogher or Greencastle   v   Moortown or Gortin
Galbally or Strabane   v   Aghyaran or Augher
Newtownstewart or Pomeroy   v   Beragh or Loughmacrory
Owen Roes or Stewartstown v   Cookstown or Urney

The wind was a huge factor, but so too was Tyrone's ineptitude in the middle third. Absolutely cleaned out for breaking ball, especially in the first half when Roscommon put the foot down and hit six points in a row.

Also at schools level. Ten years since a Tyrone MacRory Cup success (Academy Dungannon in '09). Academy won Hogan in '08 and Omagh CBS won MacRory in '07, a real boom time for Tyrone school football.
That said, HTC Cookstown won the McLarnon last year.

The free taking issue still very much at large, we are still searching for a consistent kicker after five or six seasons at this stage. Meanwhile there's Conor Cox scoring five frees on his Roscommon debut against Monaghan, including a few classy scores from the left wing off the outside of the right

Strong team. Would like to see Coney and Grugan but hopefully see them early. Can only really see , hampsey, colly and maybe Meyler/mcaliskey coming into that side come championship.

Burns would be vying for centre-back with R. Brennan as the year goes on. I'd put Mattie to midfield for McClure and get Coney into number 10.

[It seemed abit of a shit show in general,]

Yeah we were at the game and were amazed he brought on DC rather than LB but someone beside me said maybe it was cos LB had been playing Sigerson recently. I would say it's just Mickey hoping Canavan can learn quickly.

Kerry were  very well organised and snuffed out all our attempts and going forward. We looked very lethargic and almost not interested in trying to work hard to break them down. They maybe underestimated how much Kerry would be up for it and they worked harder and more defensively than usual.

It seemed abit of a shit show in general, but our record in Killarney is woeful and with the sigerson and lack of continuity in the squad general, this should be ironed out after the sigerson and I would bet tyrone taking this Kerry team in Croker later on in the summer. But it is the simple execution of skills and concentration absent - the line balls going back, the kickout not being taken from the right spot - which has happened v Donegal, v Monaghan and Dublin now so Morgan needs to concentrate on being a Keeper first and stay behind the 21 as he is a liability at present with more reasonability.

It would seem slightly presumptuous to blame / name a goalkeeper for a loss in a game which your basically saying you didn't see, in a game that same goalkeeper did not concede any goals.

Tyrone were beat because they scored 7 pts. You won't ever win a game of Gaelic Football with a score of 0-7 pts. There is also the fact that Kerry are quite good at Gaelic Football under their new manager, at home, against a team they have had a modern dislike for. Maybe they just wanted it more than Tyrone?

Yes there was a marked difference in Kerry's hunger compared to ours, but they hardly blew us out of the water. Our defence coped with them fairly well for the majority of the game, and in essence it was a poor match in terms of standard of play. Kerry supporters were bemoaning much their own play, but such self-scrutiny from the Kingdom crowd is to be expected.
Seven points, two from play, is a really poor tally for 70+ minutes at this level. We never looked like getting so much as a sniff of goal, there has to be a real moulding process of the attacking department throughout the league campaign because we looked fresh out of ideas going forward on Sunday.

Kerry's defense was brilliant yesterday. From the start their tackling was more intense, they were forcing turnovers, no Tyrone player was getting time on the ball and the space to open up a shot simply wasn't there.
Clear to see they'd done the homework on Tyrone, time and again they shut off the pathways through the middle that Tiernan McCann and Peter Harte and Mattie Donnelly tend to attack through. Tyrone were just abjectly playing possession with lateral hand-passes around midfield, all very ponderous. They simply couldn't get a way through the Kerry defense to get a meaningful shot off.
That being said I thought the Tyrone defense was relatively good at the other end. Kerry obviously had a bit more joy from open play, and O'Shea was excellent on the frees, but Tyrone were still shutting down a lot of attacks in a first half that didn't inspire. Ronan McNamee was our only real stand-out performer, thought we was excellent throughout the game.

Obviously weather conditions played a massive part but some of the handling errors and loose fist-passes were horrendous. Any attempt to get into the scoring zone with incisive passing didn't work, either the kick wasn't accurate enough or the forward spilled the ball. It was only when Kyle Coney came on at half time that we started to get good accurate ball in, he found Darren McCurry (who was completely anonymous in the first half) with his first three kick passes. Niall Sludden and Cathal McShane failed to get into the game, while David Mulgrew was way off the pace. Thought Lee Brennan should have come in there at some stage, but to my surprise Harte threw in young Canavan, who frankly is not at the physical standard yet.

Midfield was a curious one. McClure looked a bit sluggish but improved a bit in the second half. Kennedy drove through the middle a few times but no end-product, early days for him yet though. Mattie Donnelly seemed to be picking up the bulk of the work around the centre.

[I see Mickey said he's happy enough for Morgan to come out the field as much as he once as long as its sensible.]

What age is Burns?

Do people think we will be as open as we were in the McKenna cup?
I see Mickey said he's happy enough for Morgan to come out the field as much as he once as long as its sensible.
http://www.irishnews.com/sport/2019/01/25/news/tyrone-boss-mickey-harte-gives-niall-morgan-the-green-light-to-advance-1535691/

Is McKernan the new Rory B after his great year last year?

How ridiculous is the idea of Morgan playing outfield? (Stay with me...)
Someone said it me recently and I dismissed the notion entirely, but is there a school of thought that he could be inter-county standard as an outfielder? Thoroughly impressive for Edendork last year in a number of positions across the field, I don't think his athleticism and skill would be lacking.

I would be far from McCrory's biggest fan, and I've often put the loyalty thing with Harte down as to how he's still hanging around that panel, but despite my preconceptions I was actually surprised at how decent he got on in the McKenna Cup. For a supposed marking defender, he's always had an uncanny knack for popping up in a good position at the end of a move, although most of the time annoyingly so as you'd much rather have a more accomplished player on the ball in those situations.
Get the feeling Harte was just trotting him out for some obligatory game time as he doesn't intend to use him for National League or Championship all that much.
McDonnell didn't look out of place at wing half back but we're over-subscribed in that department to be honest, so he'd really have to impress in whatever scant opportunities he might get in the league to keep himself in the conversation.

Any ideas on who will be in the number 16 jersey? Left blank in the team sheet, Benny Gallen on Sigerson duties with UU