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[Kilcoo]

Predictions for Semi Finals

SFC
Kilcoo v Mayobridge
Burren v Saval

IFC
Bosco v Tullylish
Drumgath v St John's

JFC
Dromara v St Paul's
Teconnaught v Aghaderg

Does anyone know the reason why Destination Newry has not been showing any coverage
of the Down Championship games this year?

I see that the Armagh County Board have been streaming quite a few games of their Championship games over the past couple of weeks at a very generous service of £1 per game.

Was wondering that myself.  Their website is very awkward to navigate now and certainly i couldnt find any recent coverage of games.

Good wins at the weekend for Liatrom and Rostrevor.  The playoff spot is now likely between Loughinisland and Rostrevor although Clonduff, Longstone, Downpatrick and Liatrom are all still possibilites following the winning runs of Liatrom and Rostrevor.

The last round of games will need calculators and maths graduates at the ready to work out who goes where and it is hard to say who is the favourites to take the play off spot.

Who is doing the business for Liatrom and Rostrevor as they have both gone on great runs, is Doyle playing well for Liatrom?

Minor championship now down to the last 4. Warrenpoint, Rostrevor, Shamrocks and Mayobridge.  4 good teams left and some good teams now gone, Saval, Burren, Clonduff! It really was a high qaulity quarter final draw with possibly only Saul being somewhat behind the rest although still deservedly being there.  For me, Warrenpoint are the best side remaining with a healthy contingent of players remaining from last years winning side.  Does it lead towards a bright future for the Point?? This year was a pretty poor year for them considering their achievements last year.

[Mayobridge]

Finals for this Friday in Newry

RFC
Kilcoo v Mayobridge

PRFC
Burren v Castlewellan

Kilcoo were awesome tonight. They will beat the Bridge with something to spare while we should account for Saval. It should be a good final.

That was a serious win for Kilcoo over Clonduff.  The yellas are not the force they were a few years ago but did anyone expect such a hammering.  Are Kilcoo and Burren pulling away from the rest to the extent Crossmaglen are in Armagh?? If as expected they both reach the final, it should be one hell of a contest.

This really though is an issue for Liatroim, and not for the County Board. The Reserve Championship eligibility rule is probably the clearest and cleanest one in the whole of the GAA rulebook. It's also the easiest one for anyone to investigate, as official teamsheets are submitted for every Senior Championship fixture.

When they made the decision to field a reserve team in Senior Championship, Liatroim made it clear that they've little interest in pursuing reserve honours, this year or next. By virtue of lining out, those reserve players willingly accepted this approach. As I say, that's one for the club to chew on, not the administrators. Liatroim made the decision not to cater for all players.
[/quote]

Fully agree with that.  It was Liatroms choice to play those men.

[Burren]

Predictions for Quarter Finals

SFC
Castlewellan v Burren
Kilcoo v Clonduff
Bryansford v Saval
Mayobridge v Loughinisland

IFC
Shamrocks v St John's
Bosco v Bredagh
Clann na Banna v Tullylish
Carryduff v Drumgath

In terms of the bottom few places in the league and the gulf in class etc, Castlewellen were in Division 2 not so long ago, as were Ballyholland, similarly Annaclone came up and have cemented their place in the top Division. It shows that hard work and a team of players committed to the cause can compete at the higher level. Annaclone were in a Division 3 relegation play off about 3 years ago, and now they are going to finish top half division 1 - with the same 15 men give or take a couple of squad players.

As for us, a club who played Division 2 last year and back up again having walked it really - our team has totally changed and the inexperience has showed in a lot of games this year where we just failed to get over the line. We were competitive in the majority of our matches showing great effort and despite having a depleted squad have been able to steer clear of automatic relegation and hopefully altogether over the coming weeks. A few teams shipped heavy defeats especially in the last while but most of our dropped points were tight affairs and were weren't out classed in a lot of the games. We could have beaten Kilcoo away only they got a goal at the end, we should have beaten Annaclone, An Rioct (after giving away 9 point lead), ran Burren close, could have taken Ballyholland on the night - add in our four wins and still have Point and Bryansford to play that's 11 out of 15 league games covered. The Mayobridge and Saval games were admittedly complete disasters for us and took a heavy kicking against the Bridge on an embarrassing night for all involved. This leaves away to Loughinisland and Clonduff, both very poor performances and came away with 0 points, but they are games/teams that we would not fear playing and would be confident of beating on another day for sure.

The above is not an excuse for our relegation fight over the last few weeks, it is just to show how we did compete with the other teams in the league over the season, just lacked the experience to close out games and killer instinct in front of goal in a good few. Yes the bigger teams are better, but I would certainly be confident that given the squad we had for the year and with it looking like we will be in Div 1 again next year we will be competitive and able to challenge any team in the league on a given day, hopefully finishing in a bit more comfortable position this time next year.

So this is from a team, Rostrevor I presume, who are ranked 14th in the league this year - a lot of defeats but not hammerings bar the one exception.  I would expect a similar story to be heard from members of Warrenpoint and An Riocht (bar the Points last 2 games).  Why are people from other clubs giving out about the likes of Glenn and Tullylish coming up.  I can guarantee you that their players arent giving out about it and probably fancy themselves against the likes of Liatrom, Rostrevor, Loughinisland, Ballyholland etc etc etc.  There are only 3 teams this year who have consistently risen to a level above the others and that is the top 3 of Burren, Kilcoo and Castlwellan.  Burren and Kilcoo have been there for a number of years now so it doesnt matter whether its a 10 or 16 team league, they will be at the top, and will give the bottom teams in the league one or two hammerings along the way.

If Glenn or Tullylish, or St Johns, do end up getting hammered every week, do you know what will happen, they will get relegated!!!  10, 12, 14 or 16 team league doesnt make much of a difference to be honest.  I have seen a lot of games in Div 1 this year and the vast vast majority of them have been close hard fought affairs no matter who has been playing.

How long is this league format actually in place for? I have not seen many positives from it to be honest apart from the fact that for the first time in a few years the league programme will be finished in decent time.  But then when will the playoffs be done and dusted??

I think it has been quite a good league to be honest.  Why is everyone giving out about it?? Yes Warrenpoint have taken a couple of hammerings in their last two games but up until that they were quite competitive - they just appear to have given up the ghost.
An Riocht above them in 2nd bottom beat Kilcoo not that long ago and have also been competitive.
Rostrevor in 3rd bottom beat Castlewellan, the top team in the league only 2 weeks ago while Liatrom, 4th bottom, beat Mayobridge.  Clonduff are only after beating Burren!

I dont think you would find too many other counties where the 13/14/15 placed teams are capable of beating the top 2 or 3 on any given day.  Obviously there are circumstances which helped these teams to win but they still did it!

Tullylish and Glenn coming up next year along with possible one other via play off. They may well go back down the following year but so what - it will be great for them to play these BIG teams for the first time in donkeys years and who is to say they wont give them a rattle when playing at home in front of a partisan crowd.

Clonduff by a point in this game,they are hitting form at the right time going into play the magpies. Burren were short but still a very good result which they badly needed.

This was a massive win for Clonduff because it wasnt looking especially good for them with Rostrevor and Liatrom seemingly on winning runs.  Clonduff by all accounts escaped the play off spot as a result of this win. Rostrevors win over Downpatrick and Loughinislands loss to Saval now brings those two teams back into the mix. 

Point and An Riocht gone, with playoff spot now between Rostrevor, Liatrom, Downpatrick and Loughinisland.

Loughinislands last game is at home to Burren.
Downpatricks last game is at home to Liatrom therefore one of these two will definitely escape.
Liatrom also have to play Saval away.
Rostrevor have two games left, home to Warrenpoint and home to Bryansford.

The actual play off should not overly concern any of these teams as you would expect them to defeat St Johns as it looks like in a play off.  However, unless Tullylish win the intermediate championship then the play off position will also mean the loss of senior championship status for 2014.

Any report from the Ford and Bridge game last night?? Had Byransford a full team playing??

Both teams were 80-90% - Bridge missing Benny/Gavin Barry, Ford missing Danny Savage.

Both teams missed a helluva lot of chances with Kevin O'Rourke hitting 4-5 wides in first half alone for the Bridge. Bryansford were very streaky and would go completely out of the game for long periods before hitting a puprle patch and hitting a run of scores.  Ford went 5 points up (1-10 to 0-08 or something similar), with about 15 minutes to go in one of those periods and looked to be cruising after soaking up a lot of Bridge pressure earlier in the half. Bridge looked lost without Benny at this stage before O'Rourke, mentioned already as hitting a load of wides, put the Bridge on his shoulders and carried them to a win.

Slight exaggeration maybe but he did have a terrific finish to the game.  He moved out the field from full forward and set up a number of scores for other players.

King did absolutely nothing from No. 11 while Bonny, Maginn and co. delivered plenty of promise but looked for goals far too often.  Good win for the Bridge without Benny and showed that there may be life after their great team as Pluggy and Conor Garvey also came off at half time.  Ford still look a very capable team and looked to be slightly thinking of over things to be honest. 

Good game, plenty of attacking football with the usual spells of all out defence thrown in.

[Kilcoo]

Prediction for Third Round

SFC
Longstone v Kilcoo
Castlewellan v Clonduff
Liatriom v Annaclone
Bryansford v Burren
Ballyholland v An Riocht
Saval v Mayobridge 
Rostrevor v Warrenpoint
Downpatrick v Loughinisland

IFC
Glasdrumman v Clann na Banna
Glenn v Bredagh
Tullylish v Kilclief
Bosco v Atticall
Drumgath v Shamrocks
Ballymartin v Dundrum
Darragh Cross v St John's
Saul v Carryduff

JFC
Bright v Drumaness
St Michael's v St Paul's
Teconnaught v Mitchels
Aughlisnafinn v Killyleagh
Dromara v Ardglass
Aghaderg v Ballykinlar

No big surprises from the first round of the senior championship.  Savals draw with Warrenpoint probably the only one that raised an eyebrow although Kilcoo getting 2 men sent off is worth a mention, and Annaclones hammering by Castlewellan.

Burren, Castlewellan and Bryansford look the pick of teams at the moment but its very early yet to give judgement.

Football by and large wasnt of a great standard but championship football brings teams on no end and by the 3rd round i would be expecting teams to be flying.

[Bryansford]

Down Championship Prediction, Second Round of Round Robin
(leaderboard on previous page)
Highlight selection in bold or print DRAW on right hand side of second team.


SFC
Bryansford v Ballyholland
Rostrevor v Saval
Warrenpoint v Mayobridge
Clonduff v Annaclone
Liatriom v Castlewellan
Kilcoo v Loughinisland
Downpatrick v Longstone
Burren v An Riocht

IFC
Carryduff v St John
Bosco v Tullylish
Ballymartin v Drumgath
Clan na Banna v Bredagh
Darragh Cross v Saul
Kilclief v Atticall
Shamrocks v Dundrum
Glenn v Glasdrumman

JFC
Ardglass v Ballykinler
Aughlisnafinn v Teconnaught
St Michaels v Bright
Drumaness v St Pauls
Aghaderg v Dromara
Mitchels v Killyleagh