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Not much comment on the tommy murphy cup here.

I have to say that I'm looking forward to seeing the footballers play in croke park. I know this is perceived as a "mickey mouse" competition but I think Jody has done well to keep focus in the squad to get this far - you only have to remember that last year we couldn't beat Clare in casement and this year we beat them in Clare. I think the winning and getting this far will breed a bit more confidence too.

Regarding Aghagallon - St Endas. Reading on other sites it still seems like rossa may go to the ulster council about this so that whole saga may not be over. Hopefully it doesn't mess the whole competition up.

Magill and Dougan should be in the squad - they're two decent footballers and it's good to see them there.

Antrim: C O'Donnell, A Graffin, C McKinley,

M Devlin, N McAuley, N McManus (0-2), B McFall, S McCrory, C Duffin (0-1), S McNaughton (0-2), C McFall (0-2), E McCloskey (0-1), S McDonnell (0-1), P Doherty (1-2), P Shiels (0-6). Subs: C Donnelly (0-1) for S McCrory; McKeague for C Duffin.

There's the team. The only positive thing I could say is that most of that team are u21 again next year.

I would suspect that this team are still very light for u21 level and maybe derry produced some physical hurling in order to expose this.

Still an awful awful result. I was really hoping these boys could have given the dubs a good rattle.

If this is the level we are at with our "great hopes" then you would have to ask where is the real hope for us.

Can only get better...

Paul Close corner back?? Has he ever even played there before in his life??

I'd have thought Sean McVeigh is hard done by not to be playing and personally I don't think Eoin O'Neill cuts it at this level but all that aside not really too many surprise. Glad to see Gallagher isn't suspended for this one as it'd be a shame for him to miss out.

I would expect there to be a few positional switches before the start of the game or have Wicklow got some flying machine of a corner forward tha they want Scoose to take care of??

Spirit does the bus also go through armagh city?

Best of luck to Armagh hurlers in this. In Paul McCormack you have a hurler who would get on any team in Ulster and had he been schooled in Kilkenny probably there too.

Oops, sorry wrong thread milltown. No I wasn't so don't want to cast aspersions on whoever was...

Who won the last c'ship game between Rossa and the Johnnies? Wasn't that Rossa?

St Johns seem on the up and Rossa on the down so should be interesting. If the city hurling power base doesn't move from St Johns to Rossa now I would expect it to soon but St Johns haven't improved as much as you would expect with their failure at u21 level a big sign of this. They have however been streets ahead in underage over the last 5 or 6 years with GNM now catching up a bit.

Who would the favourites in the intermediate be?

I would imagine Carey, Glenarm and Ahoghill would be among the favourites? That would make the latter game a big one. Actually randalstown seem to be making good strides too so it could have the makings of a good championship.

Or are st pauls in it too?

Anyone for croker on saturday?

It's all very quiet. I , for one, am looking forward to seeing the footballers get a game in croker. It'll be the first time I've ever seen them there.

Any predictions? Wicklow will be fit and up for it with Micko about. They'll be hard to beat but sure a few goals from CJ might do the trick...

This thread is fast approaching the same standard as the hogan stand message board.

Milltown I wouldn't classify that behaviour as typical "Belfast". It just takes a few individuals and that's what it has more than likely been.

Are the next round of senior games this sunday? I see st johns are to play Rossa - should tell us who the best team in Belfast is.

The next big one after that would be dunloy-loughgiel on the 9th of september. It's a pity these two always meet in the groups - would love to see them play in the knockouts.

0-6 to 1-4 and the weather wasn't bad yesterday either - hardly a prolific affair!

Looks like St Galls could walk this now especially as they have Kevin and Kieran McGourty to come back. St Pauls have a bad record of late against St Galls.

Micko has a lot of ability at football and hurling but if he doesn't buck his attitude up he will fast go the same road as Kevin McGourty. He should take a leaf out of his brother Ciaran's(Herron I mean here) book who has always let his hurling, and football when playing football, do the talking. A man with a lot of ability who by continually doing nothing but acting the b*****s is letting it go to waste. The man spends more time in club matches moaning at referees than playing football. He didn't do that in the sigerson for he knew McGuckin would haul him straight off.

To be honest moving club, especially within such close proximity, says a lot about a person with loyalties etc.

With regard to Rafferty, McRory etc. at St Galls those boys have a long way to travel and their decisions are understandable but there are a vast number of boys from within Belfast who have shifted between clubs for what it seems is just glory. You talk to boys from smaller clubs like for example O'Donnells and they had very good players jump ship for glory.

Realistically Cunningham will win nothing major with Lamh Dhearg. The only reason Lamh Dhearg are as good as they are is because of Cunningham. They are better than most in Antrim but are no world beaters either. Even saying that though they're his club he grew up with them etc. and should stay. I hope the rumours are wrong for two reasons 1) it would make me think a lot less of him and 2) st galls would become very very hard to beat with him and young mcgourty in the FF line.

Also saw that on account of this Rossa have been thrown out and St Endas progress to the next round. Can anyone shed any light on this rumour?

Exactly - at the minute it's either hammer or be hammered for teams like Antrim the way the leagues stand with the very odd exception. This really needs to be sorted out for the good of hurling in general.

We are at the level of teams like Dublin and with a bit of work could hopefully overtake Offaly and Wexford. Dublin are progressing but even with their good young players I think we can progress as well and better than them if we sort out the club games and get a good competitive national league and I think the club leagues are definitely moving in the right direction.

They need to sort out the thing right and get an eight team division 1, 2,3  and 4. If we had it like this we would have realistic competitive games so have division 1 of kilkenny,cork, waterford, galway, limerick, tipperary,clare and then maybe wexford.

We could then be in division 2 with laois, offaly, dublin etc. Games which would be tough for us but manageable to win therefore division 1 would be an achievable promotion aim where you've actually beat good teams and learnt from it.. This division 2 nonsense at the minute where you could end up beating teams by 50+ points is no good to no-one. Realistically we're not in a position to compete wit the Kilkennys, Corks , Waterfords either so a division 2 with that calibre of teams would be useful enough.

The Offaly manager didn't care about Antrim or Laois either. He wanted a ten team to include his own team Offaly in it.

Not trawling through 5 pages of an argument so sorry if I repeat myself...

Is the CSA not about being remote from it's clients? If NI look after eastern england then it's likely some part of england look after ni CSA?

The political argument is ridiculous on this one. I dunno about the south but up here there are far too many. I've known too many people who go into these jobs and just get sucked in go nowhere and become,well or maybe they already are, lazy b******s. Don't get me wrong - I know a few in management who have done wellll but in quite a few cases the civil service makes lazy peoples lives easy because it can be the easy option for them. There should be a lot less up north and then that would not happen. That said this board would be a lot quieter without them!

People can train and play indoor football at lunch in their jobs. It's whether they make up the time which indicates how lazy they are / easy their job is...

Interesting to note the lack of dubs in most peoples teams! Wonder is that objective or subjective views...

Would Keaney not merit a place on a team?

Who's McNamara?

While McCloy was very good against Armagh I wouldn't have him on it. Dara O'se is also carrying a few too many pounds this year and I thought he waned against Cork. I'd stick Lacey in corner back. I'd stick a dub in midfield too - probably whelan.

It's hard to know about midfield. I didn't see galway sligo but saw the half time analysis on which they said ohara had a poor first half. He came off on 51 minutes so he must have had some 16 minutes if he's to be on the best team...

Cooper beat cork himself in a ten minute spell in the second half so he should be on it without a doubt.