Antrim Football Thread

[EOC1923]

If you watch U8 U9 games young players are all at the same level, the talent here as good as anywhere, its what happens between 8/9 and 14/15/16 that is the problem. Despite that I am no expert myself but I think its a numbers game. Other counties have a higher volume of clubs that are pushing and pushing which leads to higher volume of better players. Tyrone for example have clubs driving on at underage doesn't matter if their in Divison 1,2, 3 or 4. We have clubs in divison 1 that don't even field a minor team.
Same at senior club level really Derry Tyrone etc every league game is a competitive war, alot of Antrim Division 1 games are uncompetitive.

[bannside]

100% agree. It's up to clubs to push on all all age groups, get quality coaches in place and do much more than what has been attempted in the past.

Anything a player gets from  county dev squads or schools etc is a welcome bonus, but let's not depend on anything in this regard.

Couldn't be happier with what I see in PG1 underage, plenty going on in good hands and my admittedly sometimes over optimistic eye can see a club with a lot of genuine talent starting to emerge especially in the age 10 to 14 bracket.

As I said before several times, there is probably a bigger push at juvenile level than at senior, although John Mc Keever has noticably upped the ante around senior squad activity.

[Saffsof82]

I don't think Antrim have the players or panel to make these huge strides people are hoping for.

One of the problems we have in Antrim is looking for a quick fix or the easy route.  There is none. We have went too far down that road for a quick solution to work.        We tried a different approach with the management team and it has brought progress.  Time to address our longstanding underage issues, correct them and continue to advance in the long term, building a foundation for success and players equipped to deal with the higher divisions.    The crash and burn from our last exploits in Div 2 has taken a decade to recover from. New players will be blooded again next season and hungry for promotion but they need to believe in the project.

The quality of player being produced by clubs at juvenile level is nothing to do with DOF surely, its about the club. I read that interview the DOF gave to the IN ,he said his remit was to concenrate on minor and u20, same as the DOH.

This is the nail on the head. Our underage development structures are still miles away from where they need to be. Until we get that side of things right we are simply papering over the cracks.

So I will ask again, does anyone now what our Director Of Football has been up to? 6 months into the job and not a peep

[Caesar]

Serious questions need to be asked about this DOF role.

What was the appointment process? What is the remit? What are the targets for development? What will the approach be? How is success measured?

These are legitimate questions and it is very concerning that those of us with an interest in the future of football in our county have no idea what is going on (if anything!).

[Caesar]

I also recognise that GA is not answerable to us on this discussion board, and I genuinely hope there is plenty of good work going on behind the scenes, but questions need to be asked.

[Saffsof82]

I also recognise that GA is not answerable to us on this discussion board, and I genuinely hope there is plenty of good work going on behind the scenes, but questions need to be asked.

Theres a county meeting sure every month, why not get your rep to ask?

[Spike]

Spike I must be missing something here. You say Louth are on a completely different projectory as if that's perfectly normal, like they are some superpower. We beat them three times in a row between 2019 and 2021, the latest being just over a year ago.

I'm hearing now oh theyve better players, and they've more experienced management and all that drivel. Well they hadn't up until very recently (eg 10 days ago) so for me that's a perfectly normal and acceptable benchmark to measure our own progress by.

If they're making much larger strides than us we should be asking why, not accepting that as some kind of norm.

BS I thought you said you were at the match? surely you saw that it wasn't merely tactics in how Antrim were beaten?  Louth are on their own path and their own pace which is ahead of us at the moment as an individual group. We need time to catch up as a collective. They certainly are no superpower or have a template that I would be advocating us to follow, merely a stage in time.   

[barnish oggie]

100% agree. It's up to clubs to push on all all age groups, get quality coaches in place and do much more than what has been attempted in the past.

Anything a player gets from  county dev squads or schools etc is a welcome bonus, but let's not depend on anything in this regard.

Couldn't be happier with what I see in PG1 underage, plenty going on in good hands and my admittedly sometimes over optimistic eye can see a club with a lot of genuine talent starting to emerge especially in the age 10 to 14 bracket.

As I said before several times, there is probably a bigger push at juvenile level than at senior, although John Mc Keever has noticably upped the ante around senior squad activity.

Have to agree with how you are going at underage.

I took our U13 team to play you last year in the league and was mightily impressed.

Not only have they 5 or 6 stand out players, the way they worked as a team and had no hesitations in passing even to the perceived weaker players in the team was a great lesson to our boys.

Very good attitudes as well and one of the slabbering and off the ball stuff you would see from a number of other teams at that level.

A lot to be said for the coaches of that particular team and how they must be working with them.

If you can keep that nucleus of a team together there is a big future coming for PG1, as they are without a doubt levels above every other team at that age group in the county.


The one surprising thing (or maybe not surprising given who were making the selections) were that when you look at the players selected for the u14 development squad, there were a very large proportion of boys from Belfast teams and maybe only 3 or 4 from that PG1 team and a handful from the other SW clubs.

St Pauls and St Endas had easily 15 players between them selected and they wouldn't be as good as PG1 and maybe even Moneyglass, who had maybe 6 players selected between them.

I would say out of 50 selected, there were over 30 from Belfast clubs, which wouldn't paint a picture of how strong each club is at that age group.

[bannside]

A lot of interesting points being made there Barnish.

St Brigid's very strong at that age group too, I was equally impressed with them too, and a great bit of height about some of them for the age. Move the ball very well.

I'm not bumming PG1 up, the coaches involved wouldn't want me doing that, but there's a really nice conveyor belt in place across four or five age groups and work going on is top class. I'd expect to see a healthy dividend from this in time.

[EOC1923]

Could this all result in Portglenone winning their first ever minor championship in a couple of years?

[marty34]

Could this all result in Portglenone winning their first ever minor championship in a couple of years?

Regardless of club or county, more important thing is to keep lads and lassies playing and moving them on to the next age group, with the numbers intact.

If that happens, then the coaches' job is done.

[bannside]

A lot of the coaches now involved were part of the great Stinson minor teams that won 4 in a row as part of the amalgamation with Ahoghill. Quite a few have an active role in our current underage structure. But yes EOC, as a club it would indeed be a first if that happens, albeit thats still two or three years away at present.

Having said that while silverware is welcome, the Cargin model where you bring through three or four quality players almost every year to add to the senior mix is still the template.

[Would ye whist]

Onto more current matters how do we see tonight's games going?

Cargin to get back on track? PG1 to hammer TNN?

[Flanker]

A lot of interesting points being made there Barnish.

St Brigid's very strong at that age group too, I was equally impressed with them too, and a great bit of height about some of them for the age. Move the ball very well.

I'm not bumming PG1 up, the coaches involved wouldn't want me doing that, but there's a really nice conveyor belt in place across four or five age groups and work going on is top class. I'd expect to see a healthy dividend from this in time.

Interesting choice of words....Would there be the odd Tab that needs settled on top of the 4 in a row boys

[NatSoSaff]

Casements by 5
Naomh Eanna by 2
Lahms by 4
Creggan by 4
Johnnies by 3
Ahoghill by 6