Do any clubs run 'one day' underage hurling tournaments in Laois?
Under 12 or Under 10 level?
Cheers.
Maybe not the correct thread but better than starting a new one.
Laois hurling developement squads had a good weekend by all accounts with both the U14's and U15's beating Killkenny.
Didn't hear how the U16's went.
I'd love if we could definitively know are these Kilkenny's first teams or is it North/South or A/B....
Couldn't tell you that Merman. Usually there would be some mention but without speaking to the mentors involved you wouldn't know for sure I suppose.
Laois U16's competing in a tournament in Tipperary on Saturday with the finals taking place in Semple Stadium. They are in a group with Offaly and Cork and group winners go into semi finals. 4 groups in total with the best counties involved.
Hopefully they put up a good account of themselves.
Just reading that the Tony Forristal is also on this weekend with Laois U14's in a group with Kilkenny and Wexford.
Anyone have the results from the weekend? Saw some U15 ones that didn't look too bad but it seems that we got an awful hammering by KK in the Tony Forristal. This is really very very disappointing to be this far behind in development at U14 level. Kilkenny, Tipp, Cork, Waterford all take this tournament very seriously and play their best players. To be beaten by 20 or 30 points over 2 x 15 or 20 minute halves asks many questions about how effective our underage programs really are. How could the skills gaps be so severe for kids so young?
Yeh, they really struggled by the looks of those scorlines. Only scored 7 points in 2 games and conceded 51(goals and points combined)
They won't be able to stay in the A competition with performances like that.
Very disappointing alright.
Lads, we have to up our game with the underage, I think after a few relatively "successful" years at minor we were becoming complacent thinking the work is being done- clearly from last weekend it isn't.
One wish that I have for next year that there is a big drive on for the U21s. This is an age group that Laois should target to do well in. WE had a decent minor team in 2013 plus this age group has a better potential to bring players through to senior level.
You are spot on beano. However, I think by U21 it is way too late.
No point in calling it a crisis in 7 years time when our U14s are being hammered as U21s. We need to be developing our U8s-U12s to be AT LEAST AS GOOD as Kilkenny. I think the big difference right now is that we are doing great work with county development squads but the school and club level development is still not good enough. In many clubs, the lads looking after underage development don't have what it takes. In KK for example, a significant proportion of underage coaches are former Kilkenny hurlers - not so in Laois.
It requires plenty of money, focus and being honest with ourselves in terms of development performance. Right now I think we measure success by the existence of the setanta and other programs but not by the endpoints such as the scoring difference when we play A-grade counties. Yes, we are not Kilkenny but there are other smaller counties such as Clare, Wexford and Waterford that are able to develop competitive underage teams with a limited number of clubs to draw from. I think we have been clapping ourselves on the back from beating very poor Offaly teams over recent years rather then focusing on what has gone wrong against KK at minor level for the last number of years.
One thing I have observed is that the clubs seem to be relying on the county to produce their underage 'stars'. Shouldn't it be the other way around?
Yes, there have been improvements, to be fair. However, most of us want us to be winning and there is evidence that we have stopped improving.
Jesus blueandwhite1, I'd have to say I disagree with a lot of that to be honest.
I think a lot of the progress over the last number of years has been fuelled by the clubs, not the county board. Yes, the Setanta programme has been a success but I would contend that it is not on the same trajectory it was 3/4 years ago. I think our county standards have slipped but our club structures are far above what they were.
Our U12 teams have done very well down in Kilkenny this summer; we have been very competitive in most divisions. Our Cumann na mBunscol teams have excelled at Leinster Blitzes over the last 2 years and these are young lads with little or probably no engagement with the county. I know a lot of clubs are now running their own Saturday blitzes at U8-U12 grade because they don't feel they are getting enough opportunities within our county. I don't think the clubs would take kindly to a suggestion that they are sitting back and letting the county produce their stars. I'd say their frustration is that they are not seeing the same emphasis replicated up the line.
I've seen a fair bit of our U12 League/Championship this summer and the standard is excellent. I think only Portlaoise are unbeaten with loads of teams taking points off each other; great for competition. I would be extremely hopeful that they will mature into a very nice team in a couple of years but maybe they won't.
We have to remember where we are coming from. We wont have brilliant crops of youngsters every year, no more than other developing counties will. The results at the weekend were disappointing but we probably all know 3/4 hurlers from these age groups who have the potential to come through and impact at a higher level and that's not a bad baseline for our development squads. Yes, we'd all love to see us competing regularly with the elite counties but that doesn't just happen over-night...
Pat Critchley has indicated that he would like to start back at Setanta Level and I believe that would be a good step. I also understand our Laois GDAs are planning to hit our primary schools a little harder and primary-school players will be invited to coaching sessions once or twice a month. Again, this is catching them at a younger age and can only help. This is where the money comes in as if Croke Park is serious about seeing a real and tangible revival in Laois Hurling then they should be releasing funds to put Pat back on secondment from Scoil Chriost Rí and putting 2 more GDAs to work alongside our current two. Now, that is something we should be fighting very hard for. And don't think the funds aren't there after the recent deluge of high-profile Draws!
I also don't think too many of us have gotten carried away with 'back-clapping' after beating Offaly; I actually think that's unfair. Teams don't just go from being 5th/6th best in Leinster to contesting against the Kilkennys or Galways of this world. It takes time and we could be looking at 5-10 years before we are in a realistic position where we can 'expect' to make a real breakthrough. This year's minor campaign frustrated me because we had a really strong bunch but they just didn't fire on the big day. Again, that will happen to teams and counties who haven't built up a bank of memories and experience at playing and beating teams at the top table.
Margins between success and failure are so fine that if we don't take some pleasure in beating our neighbours who have dominated us for years then what's the point in any of this...
Good Post Merman
As a Tipp blow in to Laois who has lads playing u8,the structures are slowly coming together in Laois and the fruits won't be seen for another 15 years that's the reality.
What people also have to realize is Laois doesn't have the depth in terms yet of other counties,for example in u12 in Laois you have 3 divisions in the North division in Tipp you have 5 divisions.
That said it's great to see the likes of Portarlington and Slieve Margy playing hurling,there should be a target of getting another 2/3 underage teams set up and getting another underage set up into portlaoise,similar to what they have in thurles.
The U12's have been very competitive in the KK league with Abbeyleix winning it,that makes a huge difference as there seems to a belief in Laois that kk hurlers are a master race,which needs to dispelled at a young age
Kudos also to Abbeyleix who ran an u8 blitz last Saturday taking in the likes of Ballyhale and Kilcormac,from an outsider looking in they seem to being going about their underage business in the right way
In the last couple of years the county board have tried to develop a connection between schools and their local GAA club. To a large degree this has been a success. Unfortunately one school in our hurling area won't let the kids bring hurls into school. Also the kids are not allowed on the grass and believe it or not the kids are not allowed to run. They just walk around the play ground at break times.
Just one point of clarity to your excellent post merman
The clubs aren't having to organise as many u8/u10 blitz's as there is a programme of 10 blitzes every 2 weekend during June/July/August.
This is done under the auspices of Go Games and laid out by the hurling GDA's.
We have 2 GDA's at the minute,I agree with you we could badly do with two more.
Quote from: Podge72 on September 03, 2015, 01:06:23 PM
Good Post
there should be a target of getting another 2/3 underage teams set up and getting another underage set up into portlaoise,similar to what they have in thurles.
The U12's have been very competitive in the KK league with Abbeyleix winning it,that makes a huge difference as there seems to a belief in Laois that kk hurlers are a master race,which needs to dispelled at a young age
Kudos also to Abbeyleix who ran an u8 blitz last Saturday taking in the likes of Ballyhale and Kilcormac,from an outsider looking in they seem to being going about their underage business in the right way
Send them out to Clonad if you want a club outside of Portlaoise. Underage set up getting there with the town. Just over 2miles from pitch in Rathleague.
Agree with abbeyleix work is brilliant to watch. schools hurling in abbeyleix seems o be reaching division 1 finals every year!
Quote from: Helix on September 03, 2015, 05:04:32 PM
Quote from: Podge72 on September 03, 2015, 01:06:23 PM
Good Post
there should be a target of getting another 2/3 underage teams set up and getting another underage set up into portlaoise,similar to what they have in thurles.
The U12's have been very competitive in the KK league with Abbeyleix winning it,that makes a huge difference as there seems to a belief in Laois that kk hurlers are a master race,which needs to dispelled at a young age
Kudos also to Abbeyleix who ran an u8 blitz last Saturday taking in the likes of Ballyhale and Kilcormac,from an outsider looking in they seem to being going about their underage business in the right way
Send them out to Clonad if you want a club outside of Portlaoise. Underage set up getting there with the town. Just over 2miles from pitch in Rathleague.
Agree with abbeyleix work is brilliant to watch. schools hurling in abbeyleix seems o be reaching division 1 finals every year!
Any particular ingredient(s) to their success which stands out Helix?
Helix,is Clonad not in with Ratheniska and the Heath for underage hurling?
Would an amalgamation of those clubs under one hurling set up promote and develop hurling in that area and act as a 2nd senior team in the Portlaoise area?.
Clonad have unofficial agreement with Heath that if you hurl with Clonad you generally play with the Heath and vice versa. Ratheniska hurl with Clonad from u12 to u21s to be competitive as both clubs wouldn't be able to field a team on their own through 14-16s onwards. There's about 80-90 Clonad juveniles on their own from 6-12s which is great considering there's no exact primary school in Clonad area!
Clonad have top class facilities, all we need is top class players! :D
Those are impressive numbers from 6 to 12 Helix.
Keep them at it and you won't have any need for any amalgamations
Fair enough merman - thank you for giving me hope. I was honestly sick of despairing at the hammerings and particularly at U14 when there should not be such a huge gap. Perhaps my own club has a lot to learn from the others and I was generalizing. I do think that we need keep asking the hard questions of ourselves when we get these beatings though. I would love to see some data about the quality and quantity of training that we provide at underage across all our clubs, schools and development squads and compare it to KK.