Armagh next steps

[mackers]

Seriously, no messing... Armagh need to start at the bottom. Underage. They don't win enough Ulster Minor or U-20 (Whatever the grade is now) at the moment. Never mind All Irelands. Have they won 3 underage All Irelands in their history? It's not a hard and fast rule but its a good indicator. Todays Kerry side won 5 minor titles in a row. That's the calibre all teams are competing against. Develop those players.

They need a Centre of Excellence. Have they started the one that was passed in planning?

Winning on the pitch starts off it. Armagh are behind all the top counties around the country.

Can't believe I'm agreeing with you but that is precisely it.

We've neglected underage badly since 2009 and haven't even been competitive at either grade never mind competing to win Ulster titles. Thats where we need to start and we need to look at how those jobs are handed out because the development process hasn't been up to the level required. We aren't in a great place moving forward and could easily find ourselves languishing in division 3 in a few years with the lack of talent coming through and the current standard of the club game in the county.

Monaghan and Mayo have proven that you can remain competitive despite a raft of older players retiring or being phased out but the difference is that those counties have good underage systems and development pathways in place. I don't know whether Armagh will be as successful in being competitive at the top table over the next few years.

Trailer - I'm going to have to change my opinion of you. Good post.  Underage is the issue.  Like him or loathe McGeeney's been working with threadbare resources.  As yellow card says, we haven't been competitive at underage for years.  We have new guys coming onto the panel every year who've not won a championship game at underage.  it's not just about winning Ulsters or All -Irelands, it's being competitive and challenging,  winning a game or 2 each year at each level and being thereabouts.  Don't know enough about our underage set up but things were going well until around 2011 when the wheels came up.  Something isn't right. Not expecting us to be winning titles very often, but to show no signs of progress over 10 years suggests something is not working.  I see we were in the media last week with a new strategy - the second or 3rd one in the past 10-15 years.  I don't want to see any more strategy documents, just implementation.

A good chunk of our team (Rian, Turbo, Jason Duffy, Ross McQ, Conor O'Neill) were on the last u20 team that made an Ulster final in2018.  They lost it after being involved in a brawl with Tyrone in the semi.  TK and Justy Kierans were on an u20 team that lost to Tyrone (the then AI champions) due to a goalkeeping error in 2020 just before Covid struck.  Geezer has picked off whatever talent has been coming through on any of our half decent teams coming up through.  Credit must be given to him for this and I would be worried that once the lads that were on the 09 minor team hang up the boots we are in big danger of dropping down the ranks significantly.  But that makes the errors in tactics on days like Saturday all the more galling.  We have (maybe) two more years of competing at provincial and Div 1 levels and we have to take advantage of the talent we have now.

There's a strong argument for a change in management before this happens.  These older lads would have been loyal to Geezer but I'm wondering if underneath it all if they would prefer a change of voice for the last couple of years of their Armagh careers.  They're bound to know that the more conservative approach of 2023 does not suit this team.

[Truth hurts]

Armagh club football is crap, McGeeney and co have done a great job

[clarshack]

Armagh need to put more effort as well into the Ulster Junior and Intermediate club championships as even winning those would be a positive for the county. They are the only Ulster County not to have won at Intermediate and have only 1 Junior title.
Start from the bottom up.

[Louther]

McGeeney and Co are clouded with a losers tag at this stage. Between losing big games, relegation and style of play, it's hard to shake that off after 8 or 9 years. If donaghy is a forwards coach I don't know what he is doing with them.

As an example - Keane in Kerry was close, had the players at underage but one failure and he was gone. They went after a proven winner with a strong backroom team. They believed they had the players but seen that a year with risk is just a year wasted, they wanted a change of direction.

Armagh are labouring. Maybe McGeeney is overachieving but I don't know what he has achieved in his county Mgt career to date.

Regards the underage, it's a help to have strong structures in place but having 1 starting county senior player come through each year is a good year, other years you might get two panel members, a good team you'll get a starter and panel members. It's hard work but you have to give them game time. McConville in Armagh was very strong at club level but doesn't seem to fit current mgts plans. Many others like him?

Are too many resources been put into the senior set up and underage neglected? A county centre of excellence is a must these days. I remember Laverty talking about the disappointment he faced taking Down underage teams to Tyrone, Derry, Monaghan etc and seeing what they had and him unable to tell the players where they'd be training the following week. It's been massive for Louth to have it but our schools are still so far behind and players spread around them. I don't think Leinster schools are as focused as the Ulster schools and it shows. A work colleague raves about the Monaghan schools and that 3 compete now at the top level and they make finals and semi finals regularly.

[trailer]

This Armagh team is over achieving. Fans need to rethink their expectations. Ask Down what changing managers has done for them.
It all starts with the youth. A conveyor belt of talent, consistently year after year after year.

Tyrone are ordinary at the minute. Very ordinary as Kerry proved but they still bate Armagh twice this year. Armagh got close to Galway last year but they didn't deserve that penalty shoot out. They scored a few lucky goals. They bate no one of significance until Galway this year. Div 3 sides. They got relegated and rightly so. A small bit of perspective is needed here. What's the expectation? Win an All Ireland? Win Ulster? Or is it to compete?

[seafoid]

Ulster is probably the weakest province at the moment. It is competitive but the 2 are not the same. Derry are also quite limited.
Both Ulster semi final teams will probably get hammered in due course.
There is no magic formula for leaving mediocrity behind. And a lot of success is time dependent . Armagh won that all Ireland when Dublin were weak and Kerry were rebuilding.

[Armamike]

Seriously, no messing... Armagh need to start at the bottom. Underage. They don't win enough Ulster Minor or U-20 (Whatever the grade is now) at the moment. Never mind All Irelands. Have they won 3 underage All Irelands in their history? It's not a hard and fast rule but its a good indicator. Todays Kerry side won 5 minor titles in a row. That's the calibre all teams are competing against. Develop those players.

They need a Centre of Excellence. Have they started the one that was passed in planning?

Winning on the pitch starts off it. Armagh are behind all the top counties around the country.

A fair post.

I sometimes wonder if we as Armagh fans are a bit delusional in what we expect from the team. We have 14 ulster titles. Half of them were won between 1999-2008. 3 between 1977 - 1982. We have never really been what you would call a successful team apart from the two periods above. I don't know why some of our fans expect us to be winning ulster and reaching the latter stages of the AI on a regular basis. Maybe a lot started watching during our most recent successful period

Take your point.  We should be striving to be doing better at underage though.  When we weren't winning Ulster minors in the 80s I remember us contesting a few finals.  We can barely get out of the first round most years at minor and U20.

[trailer]

Ulster is probably the weakest province at the moment. It is competitive but the 2 are not the same. Derry are also quite limited.
Both Ulster semi final teams will probably get hammered in due course.
There is no magic formula for leaving mediocrity behind. And a lot of success is time dependent . Armagh won that all Ireland when Dublin were weak and Kerry were rebuilding.

Look I hate Armagh more than anyone but they were the best team in Ireland bar Tyrone that year and deserved it. They moved the dial in terms of preparation and how teams approached games. Every All Ireland can't be predicated with Dublin were weak and Kerry rebuilding.

[Nanderson]

Ulster is probably the weakest province at the moment. It is competitive but the 2 are not the same. Derry are also quite limited.
Both Ulster semi final teams will probably get hammered in due course.
There is no magic formula for leaving mediocrity behind. And a lot of success is time dependent . Armagh won that all Ireland when Dublin were weak and Kerry were rebuilding.

Have you ever heard of a province called Leinster?

[imtommygunn]

Or munster?

[seafoid]

Ulster is probably the weakest province at the moment. It is competitive but the 2 are not the same. Derry are also quite limited.
Both Ulster semi final teams will probably get hammered in due course.
There is no magic formula for leaving mediocrity behind. And a lot of success is time dependent . Armagh won that all Ireland when Dublin were weak and Kerry were rebuilding.

Have you ever heard of a province called Leinster?

Dublin are better than any team in Ulster. So are Kerry.

[imtommygunn]

The strongest team in Leinster is better than the strongest team in Ulster. Likewise with Munster. It doesn't make Ulster the weakest province.

[Solo_run]

McGeeney has become a liability with the way he acts towards officials in the game. He has done himself no favours and definitely not Armagh. He has had the best part of a decade and has nothing worth noting in this time as manager. He will always be a legend as a footballer, but as a manager this is as far as he goes. I still believe defensively we are nowhere near there, we have too many decent forwards and asking them to defend is not on, when they should be attacking. He has brought Armagh on in the last few seasons and I am cautious about him leaving and ending up with a Kildare type of scenario. The time has or will soon pass for players such as Grugan, Campbell, Murnin and Forker unfortunately. Some may only have one season left in them and I think a new voice has to come in, play under a new management style and develop a new style of play.

I think there should be a role for McGeeney in developing players at an early stage. This is where he will have an impact.

[naka]

Ulster is probably the weakest province at the moment. It is competitive but the 2 are not the same. Derry are also quite limited.
Both Ulster semi final teams will probably get hammered in due course.
There is no magic formula for leaving mediocrity behind. And a lot of success is time dependent . Armagh won that all Ireland when Dublin were weak and Kerry were rebuilding.

Have you ever heard of a province called Leinster?

Dublin are better than any team in Ulster. So are Kerry.

#
tbf there are 2 teams in front of eevryone else
then there are about 8 teams who are much the same

[Itchy]

Armagh are a bit like Cavan in that they've a manager that has run his course probably but when you look out there for the next manager you might be inclined to stick with the devil you know.