Armagh Club football & hurling

[An Laoch]

was there as a neutral last night The GAA, I think you're being a little harsh on your boys.

I thought Marty O'Rourke had a good game, a lot of good play came through him.

It was a pleasure to watch Ronan Clarke at full forward, he tormented the Cavan backs something terrible.

Who has the lad in the forward line wearing 23? Thought he did well at times, but was a little green - promising though.

Overall there was a lot of ball turned over easy and Armagh didnt have the intensity I'd expect.

[Jimmy Joe]

I take it from the talk on the Tyrone thread, Clarke wont be getting the ogs job?

Rumour has it that Clarke is away to Carrickmore.  Can any Ogs lads confirm this??

[pintsofguinness]

I take it from the talk on the Tyrone thread, Clarke wont be getting the ogs job?

Rumour has it that Clarke is away to Carrickmore.  Can any Ogs lads confirm this??

Its confirmed on the tyrone thread.

[BroJolly]

Truely awful performance last night in brefni. none of the new men showed a thing. only vincent martin at full back could claim anything like parity. of the old men, clarke had a great 10 minute spell when he was finally restored to full forward but this wandering around midfield lark doesn't suit him at all. decent mention for shannon but the rest were rank.

rodgers can't kick the ball out. smith was destroyed. his man scored 1-05 and won the game for cavan yet there was no switch made for the entire 70 mins, despite shannon going well in the other corner. WTF? Donnelly and McDonald were ineffective at wing back and McClelland was very poor. his man skinned him in the second half particularly and why o why o why does he solo the ball constantly?

O'Neill and Lavery were anonymous for the most part. the only exception being when someone gave the ball to lavery he manages to run around in circle for 10 or 20 seconds before giving it back to the man who gave it to him in the first place!

toner, mallon and marty o'rourke were totally ineffective. mallon in particular has had 3 bad McKenna cup games and simply is not getting the business done. two o'rourkes inside were ok with poor supply. newtown one was nippy but took the wrong option in dangerous situations constantly. dromintee one is a great man to win a ball but he doesn't do anything with it... def doesn't anna shoot (is this lad not more of a half forward?)

all of the subs contributed less than zero. particular mention for peader toal who played the whole second half and never actually touched the ball til 25 mins in. didn't wanna know.

most worrying is the management. couldn't see obvious switches like smith off and clarke to the square. the ball was carried rugby league style the length of the field in search of scores. the exception was the first few mins when clarke went on the square and when the ball was kicked into him and he scored a couple in a minute. guess what... no half forwards!

Agree with other poster who thought your comments were harsh. Considering the night that it was I thought there were some good performances. Thought Brian Mallon had played really well in all three games to date and hope he gets the opp to stay in this role in the league. The midfield was poor enough and that has been in the case in all games to date as well. Ronan Clarke was terrific and Kevin ORourke showed up well. Also good to see Peadar Toal again. Barry McDonald was pretty sound at half back for his first game. Won plenty of possession and always used the ball well.  Having said all that the highlight of last night was probably the bag of chips on the way home!

[TacadoirArdMhacha]

Truely awful performance last night in brefni. none of the new men showed a thing. only vincent martin at full back could claim anything like parity. of the old men, clarke had a great 10 minute spell when he was finally restored to full forward but this wandering around midfield lark doesn't suit him at all. decent mention for shannon but the rest were rank.

rodgers can't kick the ball out. smith was destroyed. his man scored 1-05 and won the game for cavan yet there was no switch made for the entire 70 mins, despite shannon going well in the other corner. WTF? Donnelly and McDonald were ineffective at wing back and McClelland was very poor. his man skinned him in the second half particularly and why o why o why does he solo the ball constantly?

O'Neill and Lavery were anonymous for the most part. the only exception being when someone gave the ball to lavery he manages to run around in circle for 10 or 20 seconds before giving it back to the man who gave it to him in the first place!

toner, mallon and marty o'rourke were totally ineffective. mallon in particular has had 3 bad McKenna cup games and simply is not getting the business done. two o'rourkes inside were ok with poor supply. newtown one was nippy but took the wrong option in dangerous situations constantly. dromintee one is a great man to win a ball but he doesn't do anything with it... def doesn't anna shoot (is this lad not more of a half forward?)

all of the subs contributed less than zero. particular mention for peader toal who played the whole second half and never actually touched the ball til 25 mins in. didn't wanna know.

most worrying is the management. couldn't see obvious switches like smith off and clarke to the square. the ball was carried rugby league style the length of the field in search of scores. the exception was the first few mins when clarke went on the square and when the ball was kicked into him and he scored a couple in a minute. guess what... no half forwards!

Agree with other poster who thought your comments were harsh. Considering the night that it was I thought there were some good performances. Thought Brian Mallon had played really well in all three games to date and hope he gets the opp to stay in this role in the league. The midfield was poor enough and that has been in the case in all games to date as well. Ronan Clarke was terrific and Kevin ORourke showed up well. Also good to see Peadar Toal again. Barry McDonald was pretty sound at half back for his first game. Won plenty of possession and always used the ball well.  Having said all that the highlight of last night was probably the bag of chips on the way home!

Think TheGAA is a bit harsh as well though certainly we weren't great. Would tend to agree though that Brian Mallon hasn't had a great McKenna Cup - would expect more from him as he's a player I'd rate highly. Did peader Toal get a good point late on from the terrace side of the pitch?

Hasn't been a great McKenna though in terms of new prospects, bar Henderson. Hopefully if we qualify some of the new panelists will show a bit more in the knock out stages.

[The GAA]

Truely awful performance last night in brefni. none of the new men showed a thing. only vincent martin at full back could claim anything like parity. of the old men, clarke had a great 10 minute spell when he was finally restored to full forward but this wandering around midfield lark doesn't suit him at all. decent mention for shannon but the rest were rank.

rodgers can't kick the ball out. smith was destroyed. his man scored 1-05 and won the game for cavan yet there was no switch made for the entire 70 mins, despite shannon going well in the other corner. WTF? Donnelly and McDonald were ineffective at wing back and McClelland was very poor. his man skinned him in the second half particularly and why o why o why does he solo the ball constantly?

O'Neill and Lavery were anonymous for the most part. the only exception being when someone gave the ball to lavery he manages to run around in circle for 10 or 20 seconds before giving it back to the man who gave it to him in the first place!

toner, mallon and marty o'rourke were totally ineffective. mallon in particular has had 3 bad McKenna cup games and simply is not getting the business done. two o'rourkes inside were ok with poor supply. newtown one was nippy but took the wrong option in dangerous situations constantly. dromintee one is a great man to win a ball but he doesn't do anything with it... def doesn't anna shoot (is this lad not more of a half forward?)

all of the subs contributed less than zero. particular mention for peader toal who played the whole second half and never actually touched the ball til 25 mins in. didn't wanna know.

most worrying is the management. couldn't see obvious switches like smith off and clarke to the square. the ball was carried rugby league style the length of the field in search of scores. the exception was the first few mins when clarke went on the square and when the ball was kicked into him and he scored a couple in a minute. guess what... no half forwards!

Agree with other poster who thought your comments were harsh. Considering the night that it was I thought there were some good performances. Thought Brian Mallon had played really well in all three games to date and hope he gets the opp to stay in this role in the league. The midfield was poor enough and that has been in the case in all games to date as well. Ronan Clarke was terrific and Kevin ORourke showed up well. Also good to see Peadar Toal again. Barry McDonald was pretty sound at half back for his first game. Won plenty of possession and always used the ball well.  Having said all that the highlight of last night was probably the bag of chips on the way home!

Can't agree on Mallon - i think he's been very poor.
clarke was only terrific when he was on the square, which was the last 15 mins.
i'm not sure why its good to see peader toal playing? in fact, i was distinctly annoyed that he was playing by the end of it.
anyone know where paddy mckeever is? haven't heard any mention of him?

[AFS]

Was in the paper yesterday that McKeever was 'unavailable'.

Don't know what that means, work commitments? Or could it be that he is mulling over his continued involvement?

[ardmhachaabu]

AFS, I have been told that Paddy will be available for league and championship

[AFS]

No harm for him to have the break then. Hopefully he's spending his time looking around the house for his training schedule from 1999-2002. Whatever he was at back then was working out a lot better than what he's been at recently. So strange that such a talented player has slipped so much in his mid-twenties, especially since he never really suffered any serious injuries in that time.

[ardmhachaabu]

No harm for him to have the break then. Hopefully he's spending his time looking around the house for his training schedule from 1999-2002. Whatever he was at back then was working out a lot better than what he's been at recently. So strange that such a talented player has slipped so much in his mid-twenties, especially since he never really suffered any serious injuries in that time.

Agreed.  I have felt for a while it could be a confidence thing with him as he started very few games last year and when I think about it the year before as well.  1 fit and confident Paddy = 2 average players, in my opinion, without knocking anyone on the squad.

[AFS]

Yeah its no surprise that his lack of form in the past few years has coincided with the lack of potency from our half forward line. In his heyday he was worth 2 or 3, and sometimes a good bit more, points a game from the wing. A lot of our recent failures stem from the fact that we've not had anyone else that could do this in the last few years.

[armagh leg-end]

Was in the paper yesterday that McKeever was 'unavailable'.

Don't know what that means, work commitments? Or could it be that he is mulling over his continued involvement?

Their was a great armagh contingent at an ex armagh legends wedding last night in cavan!

[Celt_Man]

Just wondering what the armagh team was last night? Didn't recognise too many of the faces. Will many be in contention for the team during the league? 

[ogshead]

I take it from the talk on the Tyrone thread, Clarke wont be getting the ogs job?

Rumour has it that Clarke is away to Carrickmore.  Can any Ogs lads confirm this??

Its confirmed on the tyrone thread.

As I haven't been in contact with anyone in the gaa circles in the town this week, this thread let me know about Clarkes new post in Carrickmore. I for one think that this is great news for him, a fresh start. When he first took on the Ogs job in the'98  season it was really a bit of a damage limitation excercise. There had been a big decline, all the players from the successful championship winning teams had retired almost at once and there was a couple of hard years (I can still remember that painful night in Portadown when Clan's kicked the stuffing out of us and the future looked bleak). Mullabawn beat us in the first round of the championship in '98 but the ground work had begun and the following year we reached the county final.

He worked hard with the team and had a couple of years out in between but I know that all he wanted was to see the Ogs win that championship. It's a big disappointment that he didn't and he put his heart into it. As everyone knows Crossmaglen are some team and it's for that reason that he didn't win it but it wasn't for the want of trying. He's built the Ogs team up and now it is time for someone  else to come in and try and help push us over the line. That in no way puts the man down, he done a great job. It's just fresh approach is needed. I wish him all the best in his new role

[Goats Do Shave]

I've often said this on this board; Armagh's half forward line is by-passed & misused!

They have been used too defensively & the long diagonal balls into the full forward line miss out the half forwards.

Paddy McKeever, as a result, has struggled. This system suits Marty O'Rourke, as he's a real battler, with limited skill & pace. It suited John McEntee, as he's a huge kick on him, & was used to feed the full forward line, & also chipped in with some long range scores! It will not suit Peader Toal & It will not suit Brian Mallon!