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Very good blog. Interesting analysis of Sligo's campaign. Best of luck with it. Will you be doing an analysis of the Sligo club championship or are you concentrating on the county scene?

Very good trainer also - you kept me in shape for many years in Gonzaga and DCU!!

Mano - thanks... and yes those were great days in Gonzaga and DCU

In the spirirt of the blog, I'm not going to get into matches or performances that I don't actually see and I'm unlikely to see any more than one or two club games - if even that so I won't be looking at the county championship in detail - too far removed unfortunately.

It's a shameless plug and totally Sligo centric but http://wp.me/pKvhf-2q

Most of you are likely thinking championship matches this coming weekend. Being at a remove from that, I set out my thoughts last night on Sligo's season in sych with Walsh's reappointment. They are http://wp.me/pKvhf-2q, along with other musings on the season so far. something to come back to if the heads are elsewhere at the minute.

Good news if true. Where did you hear this?

Its public knowledge now, annouced that he has agreed to 2 more yrs.

Im glad as the more i thought about it better the devil you than you dont know. Of all the recent managers has been the best, hes has to have learned alot this yr. I know he wants mcintyre and egan in next yr as he was at the tour marys game and thats good to hear. Next yr for me will say alot more about his management, i dont really think the back to back promotions is as huge achievement as others think. Next yr in Div2 will be alot tougher.

Sligonian - can't agree with that statement about the back to back promotions. There were any amount of banana skins in that Div 3 and given where Sligo was after three games, they had to win EVERY game from there to go up and still needed favours elsewhere so being in Div 2 is an achievement. Staying in 2 will be a bigger achievement again.

Don't think an Upper Tier ticket would be €70 - Lower yes but Upper more like €55?

[There is a huge myth too about tactical cuteness. Look at Gaelic games today - how many geniuses are there? Micky Harte? Jack O'Connor? then who? Grimley ... it's a myth. Harte is good but there is a very large body of opinion that argues Harte is blessed with players who on the field adapt to what is happening. In other words, don't over estimate tactical nous.]

There is a huge myth too about tactical cuteness. Look at Gaelic games today - how many geniuses are there? Micky Harte? Jack O'Connor? then who? Grimley ... it's a myth. Harte is good but there is a very large body of opinion that argues Harte is blessed with players who on the field adapt to what is happening. In other words, don't over estimate tactical nous.

Waffle......and plain wrong on so many levels it's ridiculous.

Just one of what could be 2 million examples to disprove that statement would be Fergal O'Donnell getting his tactics spot on in the Connacht Final, which was the winning of the game.

I think that s a bit severe Beard. Ok, Ros got tactics right for the game. But what about Kevin Walsh? He was touted as a master tactician after Mayo but didn't look too hot against Ros. Sometimes managers pull strokes and they work but their success is often down to the cop of coach and players on the other side. Mayo had no cop or fight this year and made Walsh look good. How good he is remains to be seen. I think he ran out of players v Ros. The true worth of Fergal O Donnell remains to be seen as well.

I'd certainly agree with all that, moysider. Fergie O'Donnell certainly played his cards well in the Connacht final but the extent to which the Ros victory can be put down to his tactical ability is debatable. It can fairly be argued that it was a case of Sligo losing the game rather than the Rossies winning it.
I'm not begrudging Fergal and his lads their win in any way but they certainly had an easier route to the final than Sligo had.  They had a deplorable league run so nothing much was expected of them in the championships. They won a scrappy game against Leitrim and came into the final under no pressure whatever.
For Sligo, it was a case of too many doors opening too easily before them and they took Roscommon for granted. But if you compare their respective achievements over league and championships, you'd have to give Walsh the nod over O'Donnell.

For my money, Mickey Harte is a tactical genius.
His deployment of Peter Canavan in the 2005 final won the AI for Tyrone and I have yet to hear a dissenting voice from any quarter. For that alone he earns my five star rating.
With regard to managers pulling strokes and being aided and abetted by their opposite number's lack of cop, you need to look no further than the Mayo v Galway game in '07. I wouldn't regard Peter Ford as being a tactical maestro by any means but he managed to pull a stroke from the start by moving his half forwards up into the FF spaces and completely bamboozled their markers and Johnno in the process.
By the time our bucko realised what was going on, Galway had built up an unassailable lead.
Like the case of O'Donnell v Walsh, it was probably a mixture of astuteness on the part of the winning manager allied with incompetence on the loser's side.
You can't really rate any manager on the result of a single game- there are too many variables involved.
IMO, Walsh has proved his worth; O'Donnell has still to do so.

Wrong, wrong wrong, imo. He still has an awful lot to prove to me and others, to list our concerns would be to go way off topic, but you put way too much importance on our back to back promotions when there was alot of luck involved more than good management. Its looking likely there will be announcement tonight on Walsh and Sligo but jees in 2011 we will see walshs worth if he stays with us, div2 will not afford us much luck and we wil likely have to play a qtr final, semi  etc... next yr in connacht as we dont play london or ny.

Without getting drawn inbto the 'how good is Walsh ' devbate which is totally irellevant, thne epic standing being given to O'Donnell's work in the Connacht final ignores the fact that with 8 minutes to go in that game, his team and his tactics had run out of road but the Sligo team hadn't the composure or self assurance to drive home the momentum they had regained. Bad decisions taken on the ball and the wrong preople on the ball in the wrong places cost them.  Roscommon had a limited Plan A that got them out in front early that screwed Sligo's heads.  If Sligo had even two players that could have risen above that Roscommon would be remembered as no more than brave.

FWIW, I think pretty much any manager can set a team out from the start of a game to achieve a given objective - the real tacticians to savour and niurture are the ones trhat can make game saving / winning moves during a game.

Park all of that and recognise that managing a team is about a hell of a lot more than tactical decision making - it is about coaching individuals, coaching a team (two totally different jobs), selection, man management, getting the back up right, motivation, planning, organising and also managing the offeecials and hangers on thta can get in the way.  Then recognise that every team and every copunty is at a different stage and point and that even within a county, a team and the need will change over time - it's a bit of a lottery and then when you add in that the folk making the decision are often acting in reaction to something that has happened (success / failure) and that they may even have a conflict... well it's a wonder anyone ever gets it right!!

Gaffer, your mate did not get 45 euro for his tickets - he had 45 euro credited to his Priomh account that he could spend in the bars etc in ythe Premium level. IN other words the only way that he could realise the value of the tickets that he didn't use and therefore sold is to spend it on Croke Park products / services.

I have a ticket - next year is the last year - and in the current climate find it impossible in my head to justify shelling out all that dosh given the many alternate routes to getting a ticket. I'm in the 'don't care where I sit as long as I get a ticket' territory

I'm with RadioGAAGAA and the wobbler here. Clarke is a unique and outstanding talent.  Greg Blayneyt to me was THE definition of a playmaking center forward and there are only three others that stand out in my mind as being of a similar ilk since - each with their own variation and personal style - Trevor Giles, Brian McGuigan and Declan O'Sullivan.  Their contributions were all about intelligence, an awareness of space, seeing the pass and an unerring ability to deliver it - right ball, right man, right place, right time. McDonald was an outstanding talent and worth paying to see alone but one piece missing in his armoury was a the team piece.  While he played some killer balls, he was never the team fisrst, me second link man that all the others were. While we are lookinbg at him also as a benchmark, it is worth noting that in his early years McD was an infuriatingly one eyed 50/50 corner forward that could waste any gods amount of ball driving up blind alleys and failing to score from worse than impossible angles - the semblance of maturity came much later.  What Clarke has though over all those other guys is movement. They ploughed in the CHF 'channel' and dropped off into MF to pickup the ball and play others in wheras as he has this abilty to pop up anywhere and open out completely new angles of attack.  For me this guy is a genius emerging before our eyes and it will be some time before someone figures how to mark him.

Coulter on the other hand is explosive, high impact and capable of the most intense brilliance at speed in tight places. I thougth he was positiively ordinary last Saturday until the game was out of sight but it must be great to have the propspect of him being better in the next game to look forward to

Martin Clarke


David Gillick

It's all a bit academic at this point but interesting thyat there are a few keepers genuinely in the running as for the last few years the keeper nomination has had us amatuers selectors struggling to think of a standout. In that respect to the point re the Rosc keeper, he actually had a crucial impact in Connacht as his save from David Kelly about a third of the way through the second half was in amny ways the turning of the game.  I thought he was very good last Sunday.  Cluxton to be fair could do very little about most of the scores vs. Meath and was left uterly exposed.  It was instructive though to watch his contribution to Dublin's play by contrast to Tyrone's short kick outs - not that they were a reflection on McConnell's ability as I assume that was a team tactic.

As for Clarke, I'd wager now that he will be player of the year. He's different from anything else that is out there and could be the catlyst for something big this year for Down

Sources directly from his own court tell me that 'Mayo are nosing around Micko'

There was also this one http://gaatipster.forumotion.net/ - I had the wrong link before - think there might be some people here on the board that contribute there also.

Sligonian - why in the world would Walsh show 'signs of resignation'?  The only person / place where that has ever been suggested is by you.  As you now seem to have done a 360 degree on your statement of last week that he was 'overhyped' and that 'If KW has any sense it will resign for the benefit of himself and us' [direct quote] maybe you might see the foolishness of lashing out with the first thing that comes into your head at / after a match. Passion and emotion are powerful things in sport and often the diffrence between winning and losing in most walks of life - even work.  Without control however they are a hindrance and a menace.

Agree with you about the U16s btw...  the stark reality that we are not winning at minor and U16 should keep the minds really focussed at CB level.

I spend a notable portion of my working life online, watching media, following business specific blogs etc. For the last year I've been active on Twitter, again tracking media, political and business figures to stay ahead of work issues. 

For some time the absence of a community of people in those spaces discussing GAA matters has intrigued me.  There is a huge population of interested and very committed people following the games. Are they just not the kind of people that spend time online or is it an age thing or what?

Blog wise there is of course the inimitable http://www.anfearrua.com - "the first and still the best gathering place for GAA content" and there are a few others that I know of such as the http://mayogaablog.com/ and http://blogs.ireland.com/thegaablog/ as well as a few others of a more general nature where the writers have an ongoing interest in gaelic games - http://action81.com/blog/ and http://spailpin.blogspot.com/ . There don't though seem to be that many that are GAA specific

I'm interested to see if there is a community of people that will follow a GAA blog.  With that in mind from the beginning of June last I have set myself the target of running a GAA centric blog. I've called it 'A Tuppence ha'penny worth' - http://gushtystuppencehapenny.wordpress.com.   It is focussed on gaelic football - because I don't know a lot about hurling - and in the last eight weeks, I've managed to keep the content pretty active. That let me say that is THE big challenge - it's all about content.

In terms of the output so far, a lot of it is long winded and 'clunky' - I need to work harder at simplfying the way things are said / written there; I'm not a journalist.  In design terms too, I'm just using an off the shelf  WordPress template - I need to get someone to do a template for me.  However the hard part as mentioned is to create content regularly and I've concentrated all my efforts on doing that.

I've just this weekend lifted the wraps a little bit and taken off the privacy settings.  I have a Twitter a/c connected to the blog - http://twitter.com/paddypastit - and have started to contribute to a few other boards with the Paddypastit handle.

Also if you are aware of others that are active, please post them on here. Also I'd be keen to connect with interested discussion boards and Twitter pages. Now that smartphones are commonplace, instant reactions and comments will be more available and readily accessible to all so I'm interested to see how much can be brought together.

This is part hobby, part social media experiment. Feel free to wade in, pass on, RT or indeed ignore if you please.

Down to beat Cork in the final

Here's my take on yesterday - http://wp.me/pKvhf-2l