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Some mental gymnastics being employed on this thread when it comes to 'peaking'. It seems that whenever a team wins a few games that it was down to them specifically targeting those games above all others. And when they lose it was down to them timing their 'peak'. All done with the benefit of hindsight or no inside knowledge of their training programmes.

These top county teams are so meticulously prepared now that I don't believe any side has any significant advantage over each other in terms of fitness or S & C programmes. Most of these lads now maintain a very good general level of conditioning all year round. If there are smaller advantages they will be found tactically or in other areas. But the primary advantage will still remain the quality of player available, nothing to do with peaks.       

Yep.
When Dublin beat Derry in celtic park Derry and Mickey Harte had bottled it, and feared Dublin. When they  trounced Tyrone, they were the real deal.
Everything they done was calculated and fluid. They were the masters of the game and everyone else were to be also rans.
They didn't beat Derry and suddenly it was all about the players that were not playing, but nobody will  identify   the players to be replaced.
Dublin will only improve and Derry were playing at their limit.
As in all matters the narrative must suit the bias.

I see Colm Boyle saying that today as well. Derry couldn't beat the dubs at 70%. The week before he tipped the dubs to win comfortably and now he's quoting the players missing. Dublin's biggest fans in the media are often the former Mayo players. I think by bigging up the Dubs it helps build up their team who could never beat them

Found his article.
He didnt name the players to be replaced on this team of titans operating at 70% that Derry couldn't beat at 100%.

Probably all the better for Mickey Harte.

'My only worry for Derry is that they were at their absolute peak and Dublin were maybe at 70%. And Dublin will raise the bar again come the Championship, I'm sure of that.'

How can he know that Derry were at their absolute peak, has he the inside track to their preparations? I'd say practically every county will improve come championship time. Derry haven't even gone on their foreign training camp yet, will they not learn things and improve their preparation there.   

And if Dublin were operating at only 70% as he suggests then they may as well just hand them Sam now.

Some mental gymnastics being employed on this thread when it comes to 'peaking'. It seems that whenever a team wins a few games that it was down to them specifically targeting those games above all others. And when they lose it was down to them timing their 'peak'. All done with the benefit of hindsight or no inside knowledge of their training programmes.

These top county teams are so meticulously prepared now that I don't believe any side has any significant advantage over each other in terms of fitness or S & C programmes. Most of these lads now maintain a very good general level of conditioning all year round. If there are smaller advantages they will be found tactically or in other areas. But the primary advantage will still remain the quality of player available, nothing to do with peaks.       

My own take on the ranking for the ulster championship (based on form and the draw).

1 - Derry - out and out team to beat regardless of the draw. 
2 - Armagh - draw lends to an 'easier' route to the final. 
3 - Donegal - seem to be a resurgence in them, should give Derry a game with a fully fit team.
4 - Down - Should get over Antrim with no fuss, and may catch Armagh on the hop to make it to a final.
5 - Tyrone - should get over the line in their first game, likely to get beat by Derry/Donegal. 
6 - Monaghan - expect them to beat Cavan and give Tyrone a game, but fall short at this point.   
7 - Fermanagh - expect Armagh to beat them, but it will be a grind for the most of it.
8 - Cavan - no real expectations on Cavan, exit at the first hurdle. 
9 - Antrim - Down seem to be showing promise, so expect Antrim to go out at their hands handy enough. 

Derry v Armagh a likely final. 

Derry's only downfall in my eyes would be injuries to key players(Mc Guigan, Rodgers or Glass) or taking their eye off the ball. 

For Armagh to win, they would need to get over the mental hurdle of caving under the pressure of big games that has haunted them this past 3 years. 

I'd agree with most of that but on what basis are Down the 4th best in Ulster? Beating up Tailteann Cup teams does not make them a better side than both Monaghan and Tyrone. Down for me are the 7th best team in Ulster. 

Is there something to be said for both teams holding their cards close to their chest for the Championship and playing fairly shite on purpose??!!

I think there's an element of that with Armagh. I refuse to believe we've been fielding our strongest team available in the league.

Would Armagh fans be shocked if in 2 weeks time, we seen 2x ONeills, Kelly, Grimley, Duffy and Nugent start?

There will undoubtedly be some changes. McPartland was handed his debut last year in the Ulster championship having not featured in the League. So I think we will try a few different things out against and Fermanagh and hopefully Down.   

I think Rian and Duffy will definitely start. I'd definitely start Oisin O'Neill midfield and Nugent at his best starts also. But since we have seen so little of Kelly, Nugent and Grimley we don't actually know what sort of form they are producing in training.

I'm hoping it was part of a Geezer masterplan to use the 2023 gameplan in the League final and then unleash the new marauding Armagh come championship time.

Donegal deserved to win but Armagh were awful. Falling back in to all the old habits I thought they had moved away from this year (Louth match excepted).

The manner of the defeat against a Donegal who will get much better is hard to take. I'd no longer be confident of an Ulster final let alone hoping for something more. 

having saw down Fermanagh and antrim they should be making it with bit to spare.

In fairness I was maybe a little raw after the match but I am not as confident as I was before yesterday

Not saying you are one of them, but Armagh fans have unrealistic expectations for this crop of players. The team is in a better place than it was but there's  still a way to go to get to Derry's level. Is McGeeney the man, I'm not sure but I don't think there is a queue for the job.  Rian O'Neill I understand has had issues outside of the game and is being eased back in. Talking of unrealistic expectations though the fans have placed too much on his shoulders and indeed Oisin's before him. Maybe just let them play football they both are class acts on their day. It was strange I'd say that the best club team in the county didn't have one starter.

this is it in a nutshell. Our fans think we are a top 4/5 team when in reality we are far from it

How exactly are we far from a top 4/5 team. We've proven against Galway and Derry in the last 2 seasons that we are on a par with those 2 sides. Arguably should have beaten Derry last season and beat Galway in the group game. Last Sunday was undoubtedly a blow and would make you reevaluate whether we have learned anything from other recent close defeats. I think we are outside the top 3 at the minute but that can easily change on the basis of one result. Our season will be defined by the Ulster championship this year as I don't think many are realistically expecting us to win the All Ireland.

In my view it would be nice to see us just throw off the shackles and give it a go. Irrespective of whether we actually win anything if we can produce football like the 2022 back door campaign I'd be more than satisfied with that. Plus it actually suits our best players to take this approach anyway as the reality is that we've been losing tight games playing the cautious, cagey stuff anyway.   

your laast paragragh sums it up. If we played to our capabilites and threw off the shackles then we could reach the AISF. As it is, despite recent QF results we arent close. We dont play good football. We cannot close out games or win big games at CP. We dont have a midfield and we lack that real top quality forward who can guarantee you at least 5/6 points in the big big games a la Clifford or McGuigan

I couldn't argue with any of that but if we opened up and kicked the ball inside more regularly to 2 inside forwards I think we would be closer. And if not then at least we would have something to get behind. We have enough good kickers of the ball to play this style and make us less predictable. 

Clifford is a generational player so we don't need to have one of those as long as we have enough other good forwards which I firmly believe that we do. The obsession with risk free football and making every game an arm wrestle might help make us competitive but it won't actually help us win anything.     

Donegal deserved to win but Armagh were awful. Falling back in to all the old habits I thought they had moved away from this year (Louth match excepted).

The manner of the defeat against a Donegal who will get much better is hard to take. I'd no longer be confident of an Ulster final let alone hoping for something more. 

having saw down Fermanagh and antrim they should be making it with bit to spare.

In fairness I was maybe a little raw after the match but I am not as confident as I was before yesterday

Not saying you are one of them, but Armagh fans have unrealistic expectations for this crop of players. The team is in a better place than it was but there's  still a way to go to get to Derry's level. Is McGeeney the man, I'm not sure but I don't think there is a queue for the job.  Rian O'Neill I understand has had issues outside of the game and is being eased back in. Talking of unrealistic expectations though the fans have placed too much on his shoulders and indeed Oisin's before him. Maybe just let them play football they both are class acts on their day. It was strange I'd say that the best club team in the county didn't have one starter.

this is it in a nutshell. Our fans think we are a top 4/5 team when in reality we are far from it

How exactly are we far from a top 4/5 team. We've proven against Galway and Derry in the last 2 seasons that we are on a par with those 2 sides. Arguably should have beaten Derry last season and beat Galway in the group game. Last Sunday was undoubtedly a blow and would make you reevaluate whether we have learned anything from other recent close defeats. I think we are outside the top 3 at the minute but that can easily change on the basis of one result. Our season will be defined by the Ulster championship this year as I don't think many are realistically expecting us to win the All Ireland.

In my view it would be nice to see us just throw off the shackles and give it a go. Irrespective of whether we actually win anything if we can produce football like the 2022 back door campaign I'd be more than satisfied with that. Plus it actually suits our best players to take this approach anyway as the reality is that we've been losing tight games playing the cautious, cagey stuff anyway.   

Key moment, bar the very soft penalty, was the Derry lad going for goal from a tight enough angle instead of tapping over and putting them in a probable unassailable 4 point lead.

Agreed. Hear the likes of James O'Donaghue saying if the goals on you have to go for it. No you dont and thats an example of why. Goes for goal from a silly angle instead of taking the simple point and putting Derry 4 points clear. He's only young and he had a brilliant game so hopefully he'll learn

Ryan O'Toole v Tyrone, went for the jugular and won the game for his county at the death. That's the kind of fearless risk we want to see more of?

Not really comparable. Monaghan needed the goal as they were behind. Derry did not.

Jarly Og Burns in the Ulster final last year is an example. Goal was on and he took the easy option of a point. I knew at that stage we wouldnt win

100%.

That wasn't even a difficult angle.

Jemar Hall did similar against Galway the year before too.

Two good examples of why you should nearly always go for the goal if it is on. In both those instances it would have put the match to bed. A lot of it comes down to the individual player and their aversion to risk. Jarly Og is a very low risk player and rarely ever kicks the ball so it was no surprise that he fisted that chance over.

Any good inside forward with a killer instinct should nearly always go for goal.   

[People went to the replays.]

They killed the golden goose with too many games in too short a time. Rem 2005 Tyrone replay against Down in the Marshes great game especially if you were a Down supporter! 2003 brilliant Ulster final went to a replay, Dublin-Meath epic 4 games in '91. Penalties are an aberration on Gaelic games, apeing soccer. People went to the replays.

The Tyrone- Armagh first game in 2005 got 60k.
The replay got 30k in a nearly two thirds empty Croke Park.
People did not go to the replays in anywhere near the same numbers.

Only 30,000! That's quite a crowd. Would have filled Clones rightly for an Ulster final replay.

or 50% of people who went to the original didnt go to the replay. Not a good stat

50% not a good stat if there were 30,000 at the first game! Lies, damn lies and statistics!

The first game was on Sunday, the second on Saturday. The first had a minor game, the second did not.

Replays will not be coming back (certainly at least in the early rounds of championship) so its probably pointless trying to make an argument for them based on nostalgia. We are going back to an era when you might only have 2 championship games per year and there was at least some kind of an appetite for replays in certain quarters. This is no longer the case and there is nothing as anti climactic as a draw in a big championship match knowing that you may have to expend the same time and incur the same expense one week later if you want to watch the same two teams again.   

They killed the golden goose with too many games in too short a time. Rem 2005 Tyrone replay against Down in the Marshes great game especially if you were a Down supporter! 2003 brilliant Ulster final went to a replay, Dublin-Meath epic 4 games in '91. Penalties are an aberration on Gaelic games, apeing soccer. People went to the replays.

You know we have penalties in GAA?

And yellow and red cards which also came from soccer. Abolish those too and lets go back to booking players, we can't be seen to be copying the soccer.

I've no issues with penalties, I actually like the drama that it brings and I know we've suffered more than anyone with 3 big shoot out defeats in the last 2 seasons.

If you haven't done enough to win the game in 90-100 minutes of football then you can have no complaints afterwards. It's also a good test of nerve and skill.

[There is a not a single team that won't be trying to win every single championship match they are involved in.]

If they do win the ulster 1st seed. They be destined to met Dublin in a semi if they top the group qualifiers and win their quarter final. If they lost in Ulster and did draw in Kerry Dublin section in the qualifiers they might be better placed to avoid Dublin to the final If they managed to progress that far, food for thought.

My thoughts:
You might be able to manage to lose a game here or there.
But that will only make the management of winning them more problematic.
Try to win every game and you will lose the unwinnable  anyway

Trying to win every game isn't necessarily the best approach in the new system

There is a not a single team that won't be trying to win every single championship match they are involved in. This talk around peaking at the right time is getting a bit mental. It's far more to do with training load than matches. If it's impact injuries you are worried about, you are nearly as likely to sustain them in training as a match, given the intensity teams be going at it in training.

That is incorrect, hi.
Amateur teams cannot go at full tilt from now until the Hogan steps. There is no recovery time. Padraic Joyce said on RTE that a team playing pre season and ending up in the all Ireland final would play 18 matches in around 25 weeks.

That's a very good balance in my view. Plenty of games with an average of one match every 10 days which is certainly not an excessive load. Everybody knows their match programme in advance and can tailor the training load to suit. Or maybe some would prefer to return to the days of waiting around for 4 weeks between matches.

The irony is that if counties weren't playing games week on week, these managers would be replacing them with extra training weekends and in-house games anyway.

Most county footballers now can hold a base level of fitness practically all year round anyway and certainly none of the top teams will have a major competitive edge in that department, it will more likely to be in the quality of player and technical skill that the difference will be most noticeable.

The best bit of yesterday for Liverpool fans was seeing Guardiola trying to humiliate Grealish. Pep has every right to manage as he sees fit but that was a show for the cameras, and was about power and control rather than instruction. Maybe there's some underlying resentment about his fee or his behaviour after winning the European Cup, but this was pathetic from the Spaniard. Grealish is a brilliant player and while I was disappointed he chose England, he had every right to, and he seems like a decent lad. For his self-respect he should leave- unless Pep beats him to it.

What happened

A manager explained to a player what wasn't done correctly.

The subsequent huff puff just sums up the overwrought overblown nonsense that is the PL.

In Grealish's next game, if he plays well, there'll be an angle that it was a professional response to the dressing down. If he doesn't play well the angle will centre on Pep losing control of his players, chinks and armour and shit like that.

Same again for the next game.

By a fortnight's time nobody will remember it. Then if city don't win the title, some gobshites in the media will "reinvestigate" the angle and bring it up continually through the quiet summer months. Grealish is leaving City one way or another this summer regardless of yesterday - he's done it all there and his personality seems to be someone who'd who'd be happier as a big fish in a small pond - so more pretend fuels for pretend fires.

All f**king nonsense, every last bit of it.

I agree with that, Sky love to create these little sub plots that all form part of the bigger soap opera. Anything to help create talking points and controversy. But it's all complete nonsense and over hyped.

[Jim will definitely have something up his sleeve for Derry.]

Jim will definitely have something up his sleeve for Derry.

Will depend on the injuries clearing up though as said previously.

He can have whatever he wants up his sleeve but the reality is that there is no eventuality that the best teams are not already prepared for or equipped to deal with now.

He stole a march on opponents in 2011/12 by covering his sides deficiencies with revolutionary tactics. But it does go to show how he has got into opponents heads that they still think he will pull some kind of rabbit out of the hat.

Still bemused what yesterdays team selection and rigid tactics were all about. I'm hoping it was some kind of master plan to conceal our game plan for the championship.

Not bothered in the slightest about not winning the trophy but in the wider scheme of things it was deflating. There must be a lot of disgruntled subs when you looked at the quality we had sitting on the bench and not used until it was last ditch desperation time.

Rian may have had his fitness issues but it's inexplicable how Oisin has seen so little game time in the League while the 3 Cullyhanna players seem to have fallen out of favour since winning the All Ireland.

Very lucky we are in the same side of the draw as the 7-9 ranked teams in Ulster, otherwise I'd be fearful of our Ulster championship prospects. We played right into Donegals hands yesterday in persisting with a short passing running game. As usual we produced a 10 minute burst when the game looked up and then retreated into our shells again when we looked like we might win it.

3 Cullyhanna lads- in fairness McElroy/Conor O'Neill have been doing that work horse half forward role that Duffy does so well and McElroy especially was excellent the whole league, can't really justify having Duffy ahead of him after coming back. Nugent hasn't looked the same from his injury and again Turbo, Conaty and Murnin inside were good the whole league so can't really complain there. McQuillan is a very good player but hasn't really lived up to it in an Armagh jersey from what I've seen of him albeit limited. I'd have him in that attacking half back role ahead of Jarly Og though.  No idea what the thinking was behind playing McMullan in a game like that given he didn't play the whole league.

Would definitely have liked to see more of them off the bench throughout the league though agreed. Surely both O'Neills need to start against Fermanagh.

I agree McElroy did well during the League and deserved his starting spot yesterday but Duffy is simply a better player based on past performances and can threaten the scoreboard as well as doing the donkey work. I think Duffy deserves to start come championship, he has enough credit built up from previous years.

Above all others, I'm baffled how Oisin O'Neill hasn't got a game at midfield. Mackin and Crealy are 2 very game footballers but are big dogged athletic players who don't offer much in an attacking sense. The solution is obvious by playing one of them with an attacking midfielder.

Nugent is a streaky player but had a great championship campaign with Cullyhanna and looked back to the level of form of a few years ago but now seems to be well down the pecking order. 

Don't want to be too harsh with management because they are watching them every night in training and in McGrane and Conaty they have unearthed 2 very good additions during the League. However you still need to be able to have players capable of performing under pressure on the big day and you won't learn that in training matches.

Still bemused what yesterdays team selection and rigid tactics were all about. I'm hoping it was some kind of master plan to conceal our game plan for the championship.

Not bothered in the slightest about not winning the trophy but in the wider scheme of things it was deflating. There must be a lot of disgruntled subs when you looked at the quality we had sitting on the bench and not used until it was last ditch desperation time.

Rian may have had his fitness issues but it's inexplicable how Oisin has seen so little game time in the League while the 3 Cullyhanna players seem to have fallen out of favour since winning the All Ireland.

Very lucky we are in the same side of the draw as the 7-9 ranked teams in Ulster, otherwise I'd be fearful of our Ulster championship prospects. We played right into Donegals hands yesterday in persisting with a short passing running game. As usual we produced a 10 minute burst when the game looked up and then retreated into our shells again when we looked like we might win it.