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Knobblyknees, have send you a PM with a couple of options.

Another good win today but Tipperary need to be winning games at Senior as well. They are away to Wexford next weekend, a tough but winnable game. If Tipp could go on a bit of a run through the qualifiers and hand some experience to the under 21s coming through it would compliment the success they are having at underage

Down 4/1 to win a match, any match, is incredible.

Whilst I would expect Donegal to win in the end, that is a seriously generous price.

Donegal are generally not the kind of team that are going to blow a team away. They can dominate games and still not have much to spare on the scoreboard. So it wouldn't take a whole pile for Down to score a couple of goals and give themselves a real chance of winning this one. Not saying they will but that 4/1 is value.

3-16 from play is a nice return for the Cork forwards but Clare played into our hands a bit by going man for man at the back. It made for an open game with plenty of room for the forwards on both sides but we can hardly expect the same kind of latitude the next day.

Cork looked a bit vulnerable at the back. We do not play a defensive sweeper but we tend to compensate for any defensive deficiencies by winning a lot of ball around the middle third. Today Clare got on top there and were able to create enough running channels to open up and expose the Cork back-line, which I am sure is something that would have been noted by some of the other top managers. Carey and Kissane are weak defensively at this level but Cork do not have any better options available so we will have to persevere with what we have and hope the midfield can win their battles out the field.

Cork looked more impressive in attack. Sheehan was outstanding today, great to have him back again as he has so much to offer. I still think the move of Murphy to the edge of the square will turn out to be a Plan B with an eye to overcoming a blanket defense late on in a game if Cork are in desperation mode. To start the next day I would see Goulding starting with Colm O'Neill moving to 14. O'Neill has good hands and would give us the option of hitting direct ball and Goulding is too good to have on the sidelines in a must-win knock-out game.

Clare competed well and have some very good footballers in Brennan and Donnelly. Tubridy is another fine player but he was trying to take on too much today and became a bit frustrated near the end. It will be interesting to see how Clare fare in Round 4 of the Qualifiers. They will be seen as the handy draw for whoever comes through but maybe a favourable draw of their own could open up a path to Croke Park.

Personally don't see Cadogan as a full-back myself. He has struggled badly there in the past. Too cumbersome in possession, takes too much out of the ball and has slow reactions against a mobile full-forward. If you are beaten at full-back there is no hiding place, every mistake will be punished and Cadogan is too loose for such a position.

Half-back for me, maybe on the wing. I wouldn't be writing him off based on the last game. He won't be the only defender that struggles against Bonner Maher this year or in the future. You'd have to wonder if his hurling is suffering with the commitment to football.

Glad to see Joyce get his opportunity. Have been impressed with this guy for a while, albeit at underage and club level, and felt he should have seen more playing time in the League. This is obviously a step-up in class but I'd be hopeful he can grab his chance to shine.

Overall happy enough with the team. I might have gone for McDonnell and moved O'Neill out to wing-back in place of Kenny. We should have enough to beat Offaly and progress to the next round.

For the last 4 or 5 years Kildare have always represented easy 'copy' for a section of the Dublin-based GAA journalists. First they were happy to build them up for the potential feel-good factor of a new county breaking through and winning an elusive All-Ireland title, then the close games and hard luck stories followed and now the same media are happy to tear strips out of the same panel and management.

Some of the tabloid-esque media will now move on to Donegal as the next focus of attention. God forbid some of them would ever publish an incisive piece on the actual football being played. Between the news print guys and RTE you could nearly count on one hand the amount of credible GAA journalists in the country who actually cover the games themselves and not the hoopla which surrounds them.

Would never bother much with food before a big game, usually either too nervous or hungover, or both. The nearest post-pub chipper at about 8 o'clock does the job for me.

The old fella is very much an advocate of the flask of tae and the ham sambos though. We were down in Killarney last summer and he brought in enough food to supply a soup kitchen. I was trying to tell him the game was only 70 minutes and we would be back to the car again in two hours and it wasn't like we were trekking to Everest Base Camp but to no avail. Half time and the food started appearing out of the shopping bag - a hot flask of tea, a litre of milk, sugar in a small bag, sandwiches (egg salad and ham), a bunch of bananas, taytos, Kit Kats, those apple calorie bars and a couple of Danone Actimels.

We were 8 points down at the time and the nerves were shot so I couldn't touch a thing but he enjoyed himself anyway.

Well done Meath, some great individual performances, particularly by the younger contingent which bodes well for the future. Meath have had some great wins in recent years (Tyrone 07, Mayo 09, Dublin 10) but have struggled to put back to back commanding performances together so it is important they produce another high quality display in the Leinster Final.

Kildare were untypically flat. They are the kind of team that if they are not operating with their customary high levels of intensity they can be made to look ordinary, as they did today. McGeeney will demand a reaction in the qualifiers and I wouldn't want to be the team to meet them the next day as I would expect a very different Kildare next time around.

Any day you beat Kerry in football is a good day. Cork always seemed to be doing just enough to hold off Kerry and I felt there was another gear to find if we had to. The positives from a Cork perspective was another sound defensive display by the backs and at the other end there was greater variety and fluidity to our attacking movement. Kerrigan and D O'Connor were the stand-out performers on the day and it was great to see Sheehan and Goulding returning from injury and looking good again.

Hard to know what to make of Kerry. It was a bit like the Tipperary game where they looked good in spells but lifeless in others, almost like a team going through the motions. They have a few weeks now to regroup and the potential three games in the qualifiers could allow two or three of their better players to re-discover their best form and add young O'Donaghue and maybe Buckley to the mix. One tough draw could make or break their season.

Listened to that on Limerick Live 95-best match I've listened to on the radio in a while-well done Clare!

I was only following it on twitter and I was getting fairly caught up in it. Crazy game of two halves and then just when you think Clare have blown a ten-point lead they summon the resolve to go back down the other end and score late two points of their own. Sounded like Ryan and Tubridy were excellent again tonight.

Great result for football in Clare and I hope we can join them tomorrow.

Tickets for tomorrows MSFC match in Pairc Ui Caoimh were originally priced at €30 covered stand, €25 un-covered stand and €15 terrace. All juniors are €5. Un-covered stand and terrace are now discounted to €20 and €10 respectively.

Whatever about the covered stand I don't think €15 to get a father and son onto the terrace is bad value. Nevertheless I spoke earlier today to a county board contact in Cork and they're expecting 20,000 at best or around half capacity.

They were actually doing a 'discounted deal' during the week where you could get terrace tickets for Cork v Kerry and Cork v Tipp for €20 (€10 for each), which is a handy saving for those intending to attend both games. I don't know if it is still available but it was a good deal in fairness, although it could have been publicized better because most people I know were unaware of it.

Agree on the crowd figure for tomorrow, don't see more than 20,000 attending.

The one thing I would say is when Kerry (2009) and Cork (2010) have come through the back door to win an All-Ireland, they were lucky enough with the draws they received along the way. And even then they found themselves involved in a dog-fight against a so-called lesser opposition - Kerry saving a late penalty that could have won the game for Sligo and Cork surviving extra-time in Limerick.

The one thing we haven't really had in the back-door is a clash of two heavyweights. There was always the potential for it but it has rarely happened, at least recently. Potentially there is nothing to stop the loser of Sundays Cork-Kerry game having to face a trip to the loser of Armagh/Tyrone in Round 2 of the Qualifiers and then the loser of Armagh/Tyrone/Donegal in a later round. Then you could have the loser of Dublin/Kildare waiting in Round 4.

Cork and Kerry (and Dublin) might be a little bit ahead of the rest but not to the extent that they would want to navigate that kind of journey because the likelihood is they would come a cropper somewhere along the way. A lot does depend on the draw which has been kind enough to the 'big guns' recently but you wouldn't want to be relying on it being so kind again.

[what are the Munster crowd doing]

Cork-Kerry is pure puke internet. 2 pages. FFS. Armagh Tyrone is headed for 20. The workrate of the Tyrone boys is phenomenal . 
Turning over quotes and recycling comments and making points and what are the Munster crowd doing yerra?

Yerra we are all waiting until the Final in September before we get too excited (on here or in real life). Might get worked up a bit if we beat the Dubs in another semi-final, particularly if we score the winner deep  in injury-time, but other than that tis' all fairly serious stuff.

I promise, we will get to 5 pages on this thing. Might need Galvin or O'Leary to act the maggot and the CCC to get involved but we will get there eventually.

p.s. And sure why wouldn't the Nordies be getting excited now, sure they will be out of the Championship in a few weeks*. 
p.p.s. He says now praying we win on Sunday and avoid one of them in the back door

Apparently Kealy has been taking the 45s and long-range frees in training this week. Not sure if he takes them with his club?