Messages

There's wrong'uns everywhere. I spent time living in Munster and a very prominent County footballer give me awful abuse throughout the game. F**k off back to UK you British c**t etc for large elements of the game. And I mean repetitive over and over. We got well beat on the day but I held him scoreless from play so I was happy enough...I actually clipped him at the end when he said something one time too many...the other corner forward came over and told him he deserved it!

Long story short, my whole experience living in the south was filled with the exact thing Joe is talking about. Absolutely clueless with no idea what has happened in the North. It was so infuriating.

If your last paragraph proves anything it proves that the British policy of divide and conquer works a treat

We in the south don't understand you lot and you have more in common with your Unionist neighbours than you have with anyone from the South

A United Ireland is a faint hope

I remember Monaghan supporters more than a few times going on about taking the queen's pound, this was when Ireland needed the bail out. I was quick to remind them we bailing you c***ts out, no answer. Donegal or cavan supporters never came out with this, Had a real hatred to monaghan supporters ever since.

I'm interested to hear how northern nationalists "bailed" us out?

When the northern state is bailed out every year to the tune of how many billion a year ?

And the British state itself stepped in to save their own banking sector by propping up their Irish subsidiaries with their benevolent "loan" which also carried the highest rate of interest

My view

We should have refused the benevolence,let those banks fail,spread the contagion and let the British taxpayer then foot the tab.

As a tipp man the only experience I've had of our northern brethren was at the u21 football all ireland

Where we were roundly abused unprovoked by Tyrone fans as free state bastards every though there's not an iota of history or games or grief between the 2 counties

It goes both ways

I was at that game too, and if you were abused by some arseholes then that's a disgrace, but to say you were roundly abused suggests we were all at it, which is just pure bullshit.

the Tipp players were no angels that day and then they had the cheek to cry and whinge afterwards with Feargal Logan even banned from their dressing room. Then in the qualifier game a few months later in Thurles Colm Cavanagh was stamped on in a real dirty action by a Tipp player. Think they had a right few of their team booked that day too. Yet Tyrone are the bad guys.

Logan and the Tyrone management weren't welcome in the Tipperary dressing room after their behaviour during the game

This has never been done before or since to any opposition management by the Tipperary management in either code and is an indication of what went on at pitch side and on the pitch as well,

A concerted premeditated effort of "sledging" with even one player getting verbals from a number of Tyrone players over a recent family suicide.

We are surrounded by every rival possible in hurling and while we have our rivalry's what we went on that day was something we had never faced before.

I remember Monaghan supporters more than a few times going on about taking the queen's pound, this was when Ireland needed the bail out. I was quick to remind them we bailing you c***ts out, no answer. Donegal or cavan supporters never came out with this, Had a real hatred to monaghan supporters ever since.

I'm interested to hear how northern nationalists "bailed" us out?

When the northern state is bailed out every year to the tune of how many billion a year ?

And the British state itself stepped in to save their own banking sector by propping up their Irish subsidiaries with their benevolent "loan" which also carried the highest rate of interest

My view

We should have refused the benevolence,let those banks fail,spread the contagion and let the British taxpayer then foot the tab.

As a tipp man the only experience I've had of our northern brethren was at the u21 football all ireland

Where we were roundly abused unprovoked by Tyrone fans as free state bastards every though there's not an iota of history or games or grief between the 2 counties

It goes both ways

I was at that game too, and if you were abused by some arseholes then that's a disgrace, but to say you were roundly abused suggests we were all at it, which is just pure bullshit.

Tipp and Tyrone have no history and given the gap that is between the respective football and hurling teams never will

The behaviour of a lot of the Tyrone fans that day was disgusting and I say that as some who's gone to white hot Munster hurling games for the past 40 odd years.

You get the odd moron who makes a stupid comment and is swiftly dealt with by his own,there was no self regulation from the Tyrone crowd that day

Curious behaviour from Northern Nationalists who think insulting people from the South who actually were well disposed towards them up to that point is the way to a United Ireland is the way to go.

I had up to that day thought we were all the same as Irish people,I don't think so anymore

I remember Monaghan supporters more than a few times going on about taking the queen's pound, this was when Ireland needed the bail out. I was quick to remind them we bailing you c***ts out, no answer. Donegal or cavan supporters never came out with this, Had a real hatred to monaghan supporters ever since.

I'm interested to hear how northern nationalists "bailed" us out?

When the northern state is bailed out every year to the tune of how many billion a year ?

And the British state itself stepped in to save their own banking sector by propping up their Irish subsidiaries with their benevolent "loan" which also carried the highest rate of interest

My view

We should have refused the benevolence,let those banks fail,spread the contagion and let the British taxpayer then foot the tab.

As a tipp man the only experience I've had of our northern brethren was at the u21 football all ireland

Where we were roundly abused unprovoked by Tyrone fans as free state bastards every though there's not an iota of history or games or grief between the 2 counties

It goes both ways

Huh. There was an official list at the trials, but I believe that, because of GDPR (I ask you!) the names of the panel weren't divulged. In any case, I was only at one of the trials, but the outstanding player on the field that time was a Port. player. Trouble is, he'd be a dual player, and is probably outstanding at football, too.

Here's hoping the media in Laois might be able to get around the GDPR and publish the panel in time.

Why wouldn't it be true? Port. have one outstanding lad, and another very good lad, so it'd be no surprise.

Yeah because everything that lads put down anonymously on a forum is bound to be true

Have you the official list of players then?

You're all over the place.

You started off by belittling our two best teams. I dismantled that argument so you're now gone back to trawling through 20 years + of records. Make up your mind. which is it?

Your a delusional fool

Get back to me when a laois club beats a Kilkenny club at senior intermediate or junior club level in Leinster.

You seem to labour under the impression that the Laois championship is anyway comparable to the Kilkenny one

Leinster club wins speak otherwise

Anyone hear or see the minor hurling panel named?

Think there was a 50:50 split between U16s and 17s last year. Looked light against kildare.

I've heard only a handful (mainly harps) lads from this years 15s have been added. 1, if not 2, from port as well.

Good to see Port lads making it,if true

Aye

"Compete well"

I noticed you said

not beat

The reality is that as I said Ballacolla and Borris previously would be in a relegation battle every year in the KK senior championship.

The rest of laois senior teams would be facing the same in the kk intermediate championship

A laois club gets to a Leinster first time in 20 years and ye lads lose all perspective on things

Remind me again how many times laois intermediate and junior teams get to and win those Leinster titles versus Kk teams

Never mind all ireland wins

The reality also is Ballyhale last Sunday would beat Laois and there's no guarantee they will win the club all ireland.

"Compete well" means win some lose some. Hence the word compete ie the result is not known in advance. The Ballinakill result showed that our 2nd tier champions can compete well with the Kilkenny 2nd tier champions so to say that Borris and Ballacolla would be in a relegation battle every year or that the rest of our senior clubs would be in an intermediate relegation battle is way off the mark and laughable.

Ballinakill the 9th best team in laois couldn't beat Glenmore the 13th best team in Kilkenny this year

That's the reality

Plain and Simple

Tell me this

How many times have kilkenny and laois clubs played each other in junior intermediate and senior Leinster club championships down the years ?

How many times have Laois clubs won out of that total

Maybe we should do similar with Offaly,Wexford,Dublin?

What county have ye a greater win than loss% against?

Even your senior clubs record against other county's senior club representatives have been laughable since the turn of the century.

If the laois senior club championship was in any way comparable to the kilkenny one,laois clubs would be winning Leinster championships

Not appearing in one in 20 years and then setting all sorts of unwanted records

Aye

"Compete well"

I noticed you said

not beat

The reality is that as I said Ballacolla and Borris previously would be in a relegation battle every year in the KK senior championship.

The rest of laois senior teams would be facing the same in the kk intermediate championship

A laois club gets to a Leinster first time in 20 years and ye lads lose all perspective on things

Remind me again how many times laois intermediate and junior teams get to and win those Leinster titles versus Kk teams

Never mind all ireland wins

The reality also is Ballyhale last Sunday would beat Laois and there's no guarantee they will win the club all ireland.

Tipperary

Hurling
Expectation To win Liam McCarthy as we expect to every year

Hope
That the dog eat dog nature of a round robin Munster Championship dents Limerick

Football
Get out of Division 4

Hope
That with the likes of Quinlivan not committing,we don't nose dive even further

Great year for Cbolla but folks they got a serious trimming Sunday unfortunately I think the biggest beating every in a leinster club final. They standard of kkenny club hurling and Laois club hurling is miles apart wheather we like it or not.

The Shamrocks look to be exceptional.

I'd fancy any of our top clubs to compete with the rest of the Kilkenny clubs.

Completely delusional even laughable comment

For the Last 20 odd years the Kilkenny coupled with the Galway Championships have been the 2 highest quality Senior Hurling Club Championships in the Country

Ballacolla got an absolute whipping in the leinster final breaking the 1991 record set by Birr v Ballyhale.

As a line of Form

Ballyhale beat Ballacolla by 27 points

in the Kk championship

They beat OLG by 4 Points in the Final

In the Semi Final James Stephens by 6 points

in the quarter final Bennetsbridge by 9 points

Are lads seriously thinking that either Ballacolla or Borris  Kilcotton would break into the top 8-10 Senior clubs in Kilkenny?

as for the remainder of laois senior clubs they would be very lucky if any of them were to survive the intermediate grade.

The Shamrocks skew everything. You conveniently left out that they beat Tullaroan (semi Finalists) by about 30 points and beat a very good Dicksboro team in last years final by 20.

I'd be pretty sure that Ballacolla or Borris could beat Erins Own or The Rower Inistioge or Lisdowney or Clara or Graigue Ballycallan.

A better line of form would be how close Ballinakill (without Cha) got to Glenmore. Glenmore won the KK intermediate and therefore could conceivably be considered top ten in Kilkenny. Ballinakill are 8th or 9th in Laois.

The 9th best team in laois "got close" to the 13th best team in Kilkenny

That the problem here ye confuse moral victories with actual victories

out against Tipp in the first round of the League in Portlaoise

Saturday the 5th of feb at 6pm

Great year for Cbolla but folks they got a serious trimming Sunday unfortunately I think the biggest beating every in a leinster club final. They standard of kkenny club hurling and Laois club hurling is miles apart wheather we like it or not.

The Shamrocks look to be exceptional.

I'd fancy any of our top clubs to compete with the rest of the Kilkenny clubs.

Completely delusional even laughable comment

For the Last 20 odd years the Kilkenny coupled with the Galway Championships have been the 2 highest quality Senior Hurling Club Championships in the Country

Ballacolla got an absolute whipping in the leinster final breaking the 1991 record set by Birr v Ballyhale.

As a line of Form

Ballyhale beat Ballacolla by 27 points

in the Kk championship

They beat OLG by 4 Points in the Final

In the Semi Final James Stephens by 6 points

in the quarter final Bennetsbridge by 9 points

Are lads seriously thinking that either Ballacolla or Borris  Kilcotton would break into the top 8-10 Senior clubs in Kilkenny?

as for the remainder of laois senior clubs they would be very lucky if any of them were to survive the intermediate grade.

The senior hurlers/opportunity

I am a cheddar fan. His enthusiasm and love for hurling and laois cannot be matched. After the fiasco of Eddie leaving I felt Cheddar was a good appointment. He is not another teddy Mc or Eamonn Kelly type journey man. He has put a very impressive backroom team in place with Franny Forde considered one of the best coaches around. Cheddar will have his ducks in a row and if he gets buy in he will have the team very well prepared for battle. Last year against Wexford was a shambles.  I am all for trying new things but the game was over after 15 minutes and the plan just didn't work. It looked like this was the first time they had tried this system. Surely a league match or a few practice matches would have shown the management this wasn't going to work? However, Cheddar listened to the players and changed things up. We beat Antrim and we really could have beaten Waterford who are probably the second best team in the country in my opinion. In that game we were totally outclassed in the first half and it looked like we would take another beating. Far from it though as the lads showed some character and class to battle back to lead with 5 mins to go. Cheddar and his management made a few changes that got us back into the game and they deserve credit for that. He also made a couple of big calls before the game having lost R Mullaney and L Cleere. Moving F C Fennell back on Dessie Hutchinson was an inspired move as fennel did as good a job as anyone on one of the best forwards in the country.
A great win against Antrim followed by an outstanding and impressive performance against Waterford sets us up nicely coming into 2022. Wexford and Dublin are not that good, Kilkenny are workmanlike but they haven't got the players they had before to scare you and Galway wont be bad but will be in a bit of transition. I genuinely believe that if we can get a few more to commit and get a full buy in from the panel that we could get a couple of wins, get out of the group and have a right crack at leinster. Following that what are our goals over the next two/three years? For me it should be getting to a leinster final. Imagine the hysteria that would bring to the county. Laois people showed in 2019 that they are crying out for a team to follow and I don't think a leinster is beyond us!

Non committals/regrets

This is a well flagged and massive issue in the past, currently and in the future for Laois hurling and football. I struggle to understand it. People will throw out the 'ah sure why would they bother' 'sure laois are at nothing' 'the commitment is savage'. I look at it as such an honour, it's a huge privilege in most other hurling counties. Clubs and general public in Laois don't help and many would discourage lads from going in. Its an awful shame. I appreciate it curtails their social life but most intercountry players are finished by the time they are 32. They have a good 40 years to socialise after that. They only get a few years to have a proper go at it. I really believe that the ones that haven't committed will look back with a huge amount of regret when they finish hurling. They will carry that regret for a long time. They are putting the effort in with their clubs so it's literally only another couple of months that they would do with the county anyway. I would also question why we have so many defections in laois compared to other counties. Im not talking about the likes of limerick or Kilkenny but the likes of Carlow and Offaly hurlers have very few that don't commit. Eddie Brennan commented that 22 players had not committed in 2019, that's staggering.
Im not sure if there is an answer for this but I would question if the management and in particular the co boards efforts to get lads on board and keep them on board. Everything that needs to be done should be done, im talking along the lines of helping with job opportunities(locally), college scholarships, transport to training, expenses etc. David Dooley was in with laois seniors last year until he was told he couldn't play. One of our most promising up and coming prospects was lost to rugby, could more have been done to keep him with the u20s for the year, he could have made the difference against Kilkenny. I wish him well in whatever he chooses to do in the future but hopefully we will see him in the blue and white of laois again.

Leigh Bergin, Gearoid Burke, Joe Campion, Colm Stapleton, Cathal Dunne, Aidan Corby, Mark Dowling, Robbie Phelan, Liam O Connell are just a few I'd like to see involved

Letting them live a little

Eddie Brennan was a breath of fresh air for the players when he was involved. Letting them have a few pints after the McDonagh success and after the Dublin match was well documented as a positive move and one that the players really appreciated and to be fair the were professional enough not to take the piss. For all Cheddars good traits I think he needs to rejuvenate the panel and bring a bit of a fun element into the set up. I heard of hour upon hour long meetings going over tactics sucked the life and good out of the players at times last year. You would wonder about it considering how they played against wexford.

Line Balls

Just a word on this, we gave up some very soft scores especially in the league from very poor line balls out of the backs in particular last year. Needs to be worked on

Forwards/Scoring power

Against Waterford last year if we had another forward playing well we would have won. Roddy was well held and when he was we had little support for paddy Purcell and cha. Unfortunately mark kav was and will be a loss. Outside of that we need to be getting more from our other forwards and maybe unearth a couple of new ones. Of the ones that are there, picky needs to be playing up there and not at wing back, we have plenty of wing backs and hes in the form of his life for his club in the forwards. We need to get more out of Aaron dunphy who was outstanding for B/K this year putting up big scores. Would like to see Ben Conroy get a good run in the league, see what he can do. There are some promising players from the u20 set up also but some of them may want to stay with the u20s again this year as they should have a decent outfit and its probably hard to blame them.

Personnel options
GK – Rowland, Simms, (Fleming and Dunne if interested)
Backs – Cleere, Hartnett, Conway, Fennell, Downey, P Delaney, Mullaney, McEvoy, Kelly
Midfield – Purcell, Kelly, Lennon, Fennell, Keyes
Forwards – Purcell, Cha, Picky, Roddy, Willie Dunphy, Aaron Dunphy, Collier, Lyons, Conroy, Scully, Ryan

Excellent Post