Antrim Football Thread

[Points a Good Score]

I took a trip up to see the minors on Sunday night and with all the chat about this strong Donegal minor team I traveled more in hope than expectation and from basically the throw in Donegal charged through the middle hitting the cross bar and fortunately going over, at that stage it looked like the fears might have been right.

Antrim settled well into the game after that and had the majority of possession and were patient against the Donegal blanket, they missed/dropped short I think I'm right in saying 5 frees in the first half, the way Donegal were set up it was imperative these chance were taken.

Second half started very well for again dominating possession and young Fyfe getting in for the first goal at the time I thought he should have squared it but he finished it very well, the Donegal keeper then took what could only be described as a very strange kick out which landed at Fyfes feet he duly gathered it up and rattled the net again. 7 up with 12 minutes to go. At this stage I was convinced Antrim would win as they had been defending well. Donegal however never panicked and struck 2 goals in as many minutes to bring them back into the game and followed it with a few excellent points. The Antrim lads while they continued to battle manfully seemed rocked by the comeback and were unable to claw there way back.

Whilst it wasn't the changing of the game shortly after Donegal had a man sent off for what seemed to be an off the ball infringement, I felt the referee very harshly gave Paul Mulholland a black card whilst he possibly fouled it didn't look as if it warranted a black, this coupled with his previous yellow left Antrim down to 14 also, I think had they kept the full complement on the pitch Antrim would have see the game out.

Very disappointing result but some tremendous talent on show which certainly bodes well for the future, of the names Bannside mentioned Matthew Hamill came on as a sub on Sunday whilst the others weren't involved for reasons I don't know.  From chatting to a few people at the match it seems a number of players are available again next year and that allied along with a strong squad of under 16's this year certainly paints a good picture moving forward.

[Milltown Row2]

Limerick "at home" in the qualifiers.

Casement will be buzzing

[themac_23]

Where will the game be played? are there any stadium requirements for qualifier games?

[Milltown Row2]

Where will the game be played? are there any stadium requirements for qualifier games?

Corrigan??

[theskull1]

Any pitches on Rathlin 

[themac_23]

Where will the game be played? are there any stadium requirements for qualifier games?

Corrigan??

Was thinking that myself, was just wondering was there any requirements for so many seats etc for the qualifiers? Doubt there is, cant see there being too big of a crowd tbf

[country bumpkin]

Was at Creggan last nite and was impressed

[bannside]

Good performance alright CB. Matt Fitz was class he really is turning into one good footballer. Thought Patrick Gallagher did his starting claims no harm, KOBO back to his best again and Niblock was a better than anything Derry could find to attempt to mark him. Ryan Murray must start every time for Antrim. Class act.

[BrendanAntrim]

So the footballers appear to have an option of taking the qualifier game to Croke Park as part of a double header with CR replay. Personally I reckon that winning the Limerick game is all that matters - we get home advantage so rarely in the championship these days that we should stick with it. Bring Limerick to Corrigan, I imagine they would prefer a Croke Park fixture so for that reason alone, stick to Corrigan, win the game and think about Croke Park later in the year.

[themac_23]

So the footballers appear to have an option of taking the qualifier game to Croke Park as part of a double header with CR replay. Personally I reckon that winning the Limerick game is all that matters - we get home advantage so rarely in the championship these days that we should stick with it. Bring Limerick to Corrigan, I imagine they would prefer a Croke Park fixture so for that reason alone, stick to Corrigan, win the game and think about Croke Park later in the year.

Agreed, Croke Park should be where we aspire to be, not where we are to try and give us a sweetener because of the hurling fiasco, nice and tight at Corrigan will suit us far better. Limerick are more than beatable, home advantage is gonna be very important.

[bannside]

I'm really stuck here. Merit in both. Corrigan means Limk will need to travel the night before or be stuck on a bus for four and a half hours. Home venue definitely worth a few points at least.

But Croker is a massive pitch and if Limk are as big and strong as usual then the open spaces will really suit us....IF.....our managers pick a team that are mobile and play a quick ball then we have the tools to beat Limerick. In that case my advice is to keep it wide and create huge spaces so that we could get our pacy players on the ball. Imagine Ryan and Tomas inside with space to do their thing. As John Morrison would say hit the spaces not the faces!

We see too much pedestrian stuff with too many players who want to stand and toe tap the ball before moving it sideways or backways. It's not rocket science. These players are killing us at the minute and on Wednesday night past, against Derry, this was thankfully absent from our game. Hopefully lessons are being learned because we have the speed on the right places if we can speed our overall game up.

Quicker hands and quicker ball needed with much less carrying balls onto tackles. Watch Tyrone.

So whereever the match is played that style should get us over the line.

[BrendanAntrim]

Fair points but let's be honest, we should be beating Limerick wherever we play them. They got relegated from 3 to 4, and only managed 1 point in the league. We should accept that we have better players, send out our best, most attacking players, in forward positions, and win by 10 points. 

[BrendanAntrim]

Its a standalone fixture at 2pm, Saturday week in Corrigan. A wise decision I think / hope.

[bannside]

Corrigan it is then. I can see why the management wanted it there so let's back them and get a decent crowd up on Saturday week. Limerick will be a test alright but this is thoroughly winnable if we go out and try to beat them on the scoreboard. Agree 100% with Brendan on his above assertion. After all....isn't this how we beat Laois last year having been a mile behind at one stage!

Surely lessons have been learnt at this stage. We open up for ten minutes against Fermanagh and looked excellent...scoring five points in a row against a good division two outfit.

They will be big and strong and I don't think we should be standing back inviting them on to us. Depending on the team selection our biggest asset would be pace so I would be utilising that by pushing up and wide and making as much space as possible. I'd be worried about slugging it out with them and trying to hit them on the counter.

We need to be much quicker too in everything we do. The last two public games were far too pedestrian with several players spending far too much time on the ball....but ending up doing nothing with it.

If the players are freed up to go out and really express themselves as footballers we can take a scalp or two.

[themac_23]

Corrigan it is then. I can see why the management wanted it there so let's back them and get a decent crowd up on Saturday week. Limerick will be a test alright but this is thoroughly winnable if we go out and try to beat them on the scoreboard. Agree 100% with Brendan on his above assertion. After all....isn't this how we beat Laois last year having been a mile behind at one stage!

Surely lessons have been learnt at this stage. We open up for ten minutes against Fermanagh and looked excellent...scoring five points in a row against a good division two outfit.

They will be big and strong and I don't think we should be standing back inviting them on to us. Depending on the team selection our biggest asset would be pace so I would be utilising that by pushing up and wide and making as much space as possible. I'd be worried about slugging it out with them and trying to hit them on the counter.

We need to be much quicker too in everything we do. The last two public games were far too pedestrian with several players spending far too much time on the ball....but ending up doing nothing with it.

If the players are freed up to go out and really express themselves as footballers we can take a scalp or two.

Let our footballers actually try and play football and see where that gets us, get the handbrake off!