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Word of warning on Offaly........They have played two challenges since the roscommon game and won both of them. Defeated a strong laois 15 last weekend(11 starters from team that beat donegal) by 6 points and beat wicklow the week prior to that 18 points to 13. Expect a better showing from them atleast but whether that is enough to beat Antrim is another question. Im guessing Niall Mc Namee is back judging on those results

Offaly ebbed even lower tonight.

This is why challenge matches should never even enter into the equation. They are glorified training sessions against other teams, not full intensity matches. It's completely unpredictable as to what a win or a lose in challenge matches does to a team, or if it does anything at all.

So Antrim will arrive at the Hyde unbeaten. We have to be looking at the next seven days as an opportunity to all but assure promotion.

Garrycastle can make this a very simple exercise if they win the middle. Mulvehill is a great distributor of the ball and in Dessie Dolan they have a player who can give the Cross backs as bad a day at the office as Kilbride did in last year's final. Garrycastle know this is their one chance to win an All-Ireland.

Garrycastle to pull one out of the fire.

Wouldn't touch the Longford-Roscommon game with a radiation suit on.

We've got Ian and Senan Kilbride, Mannion, Domincan and Cregg back and the injuries incurred in the Offaly game were minor so all those players are fit as well. Not to mention that the Sigerson cup is over now which means the Roscommon u-21 team DCU could field at their whim is fully available to cover if needed. The game'll be way to close to call and those odds are way too tight to risk money on it.

How bad were Offaly against Roscommon? The 11/5 about them away to Antrim looks big enough considering the result in that game looked at least superficially respectable.

They were woeful, honestly. Too many men back and alot of aimless kicking because they had no outlets up front. We lost four of our top seven available forwards and were still hardly troubled, Offaly were three behind when they got a soft enough penalty and didn't score a single point in the remaining 10-15 minutes. They're short on confidence now and I'd question them being able to put up much resistance to an Antrim team that's going well.

[As for NFL Semis .... for f**** sake . Next we'll have quarter finals ... and then why not a round of 16 as well .]

Well, nearly 3,000 people were interested on Sunday!

How did it take up valuable weekends? The NFL will be finished at the same time as last year (even with the semis), club finals on St Patricks day as usual, championship starts at same time. What competition were disrupted because of the Railway Cup? None!

3,000 from an Ulster "GAA friendly" population of around 1 million. How many travelled from Munster I wonder.
2,860 was official attendance.
How many NFL games could have been played last 2 weekends and avoid having 4 games in 4 successive weekends which has to have a negative effect on attendances.
As for NFL Semis .... for f**** sake . Next we'll have quarter finals ... and then why not a round of 16 as well . 
Mid Louth -- I don't sit around talking sh1te in Committees - I'd  be out doing things.
Only place I express opinions ( sensible ones in my view  ) is here in GAABoard.

Semis are fantastic. Their removal took an edge out of the league structure. Obviously they should be two semi finalists each from an amalgamated D1 and D2, though. 4/7 in one division is a little silly, to say the least. I just hope the brass are using the semis this year as a transitional phase towards going back to 1A/B divisions, it'll help elevate plenty of teams by playing better opposition as well as freshening up what's become a league that's a little stagnant at the top end.

[Hard to know our team but sounds like the St. Brigids lads will be used as impact subs?]

Yep big local derby this Sunday must be the first time in a long time that Longford are favorites & tbh  they deserve to be e.g more impressive in the opening 2 games plus home advantage.

Hard to know our team but sounds like the St. Brigids lads will be used as impact subs? good to have Cregg back & Cathal Shine back in training (we'll need him for the U-21 game in a few weeks) Is Brian kavanagh back for longford?

Should be decent crowd in Pearse stadium if i was offered a draw now i would take it but a win for either side would put them in promising position.

I see no reason not to start both Senan and Ian Kilbride from the start, honestly. Ian's in great form and Senan is probably the very best forward in the entire province. If they're fit and want to play, they should start. Mannion would be a huge help in the middle - our real trouble spot so far in the league - if he finds form. The reports didn't seem to make mention of Domincan so I don't know about his availability for the Longford game.

What will our forward-line look like?


Kennan   Cregg   Shine

Devanney  Kilbride  Heneghan ?


I'd prefer Kilbride over Shine to be in the half-forwards. Shine didn't look all that comfortable against Tipp there, but that had everything to do with his recent troubles under high balls. O'Gara might be a dark horse at 11/13 but I'd doubt if Newton wants to through him in at the deep end just yet.

Whatever our line-up ends up being we'll have a very good set of forwards on the field.

It's amazing that a whole county can't find 22 or so players that care about football enough to be dedicated to training and representing their county. No one is asking them to be good or even win matches, but no football first county almost purposefully makes a show of their hurling team like Kilkenny do their football set-up.

They should take the Cavan approach for senior hurling and apply it to all levels and just resign from inter-county competition if this is the best they can come up with, it's a waste of every team they play's time and money.

With our interest in the Club championship over for this year and the silly diversions of sigersons and Railways out of the way  - the real world resumes this coming weekend.
We're making the short trip to Pearse Park to take on the Larries and it's about time we bet them following a draw and a defeat last season.
Don't know if any Beidgets lads will be back and I'm hoping some of our injured might be ready. This will be a good one to win but at least with 4 points under the belts it's not the end of the world if we slip up.

Newton said as much as the Brigids lads will be playing in the Hearld today. He also said only Enda Kenny was seriously injured versus Offaly (a broken bone in his hand, Rodgers is unlikely to play but that it's an outside possibility tells you he's got nothing particularly serious) and that Cathal Shine is back training with the team, something that should excite any Roscommon fan.

Is this the night of the living dead?

What are the views on next weekend fixtures? i fancy Dublin away to laois 2/5, tyrone away to louth,Longford 10/11 to beat ross, wexford at home 8/15 to beat tipp and Antrim also in div 3 4/9 to beat offaly.. few others like kerry away at down and cork at donegal are tempting

Wouldn't touch the Longford-Roscommon game with a radiation suit on.

We've got Ian and Senan Kilbride, Mannion, Domincan and Cregg back and the injuries incurred in the Offaly game were minor so all those players are fit as well. Not to mention that the Sigerson cup is over now which means the Roscommon u-21 team DCU could field at their whim is fully available to cover if needed. The game'll be way to close to call and those odds are way too tight to risk money on it.

[They got Donie Smith and John McManus (son of one of the finest forwards in the history of the game, Tony McManus) this year]

DCU have an excellent eye for talent. They got Donie Smith and John McManus (son of one of the finest forwards in the history of the game, Tony McManus) this year, who both featured prominently in our 2011 minor championship run, among plenty of other Roscommon under-age players. Clearly Roscommon isn't the only county they've selected exciting players from either.

At minimum both Smith and McManus will be future starters for the county - both are already involved with the senior panel - so if you're sick of DCU already it isn't going to get any better.

In strong defence of DCU, I've seen first-hand how much their input has helped players like Donie Shine, Cathal Cregg and, on recent form, David Keenan, develop. They're also imbuing players from counties other than the top three or four with the confidence that there's very little between them and the very best teams in the country and that can only ever be very good thing for the game at large.

Are you mixing up Smith with Conor Daly? as Donie is in his 2nd year with DCU after winning the freshers with them last year he was on the DCU sigerson panel then got injured v Longford in the O`Bryne cup. Mc Manus,Daly,Finbar Cregg,Oates etc are all part of the DCU freshers team this year (they lost the final to Queens yesterday btw)

As for the guys asking why Cregg,Kelly,Murphy weren't starting well all are just back from injury & i'm sure the counties would be asking DCU to ease them back into action.

Yeah, my mistake! It's sometimes easy to get confused , especially since for obvious reasons I associate McManus and Smith first with last year's minor team.


HE football and hurling should be deeply focused on being a development bed for players and not a level trying to pretend it exists on an island. It's not even the #1 competition for 18-21 year olds, the main source of these players, after all.

And yes, offering elite scholarships is an issue that effects competitiveness but when those guys will likely killing themselves for a decade or more with their club and county, literally doing a second unpaid job, I have zero problems with elite scholarships.

More should be offered by any colleges serious about competing. Set limits, make it more like NCAA sports in the US, but wishing them away will get you no where.

DCU have an excellent eye for talent. They got Donie Smith and John McManus (son of one of the finest forwards in the history of the game, Tony McManus) this year, who both featured prominently in our 2011 minor championship run, among plenty of other Roscommon under-age players. Clearly Roscommon isn't the only county they've selected exciting players from either.

At minimum both Smith and McManus will be future starters for the county - both are already involved with the senior panel - so if you're sick of DCU already it isn't going to get any better.

In strong defence of DCU, I've seen first-hand how much their input has helped players like Donie Shine, Cathal Cregg and, on recent form, David Keenan, develop. They're also imbuing players from counties other than the top three or four with the confidence that there's very little between them and the very best teams in the country and that can only ever be very good thing for the game at large.

Fair enough, people don't like Tommy Lyons. You could afix almost any inter-county manager's name and you'd still get a raft of snide comments so that's hardly the issue - this is a rampant problem and Mayo just happen to be the county caught with their hand in the cookie jar.

Nothing more, nothing less.

If we best buddies with both of the world's hyper powers and the jobs start rolling in no one will care one jot about Tibetan monks or displaced village people. We, like everyone else, lose our morals very fast when we see the economics of being in bed with China.

China will probably end up more democratic in time, but the fact is the outside world has entirely zero influence on that process and John Gormley-ing it up and snubbing the Chinese is akin to punching ourselves in the face repeatedly.

But sure if he picked himself in the middle Sligo'd be unstoppable...