Antrim Hurling

[NAG1]

Ballygalget V Cdall - Dall
Ballycran V Loughgiel - Shams
Portaferry V Dunloy - Dunloy

ALL THREE CORRECT!


3 really tough and interesting trips for the top3 here!
I am picking the 3 Antrim teams but none of these games would be a surprise if the Ards boys turned them over.

ALSO CORREEXT GIVEN HOW CLOSE GAMES WERE.

Ballycastle V St Johns - Town to win.
Glenarrife V Rossa
I will be at this if the weather holds up. Think Oisins recent win and Rossa's bad start plus disastrous record on the road makes me plump for Oisins by 4 or 5.

BOTH CORRECT

Sarsfields to beat Carey CORRECT
St Galls to beat Lamh Dearg CORRECT
Randalstwon to beat Gort DRAW
Armoy / StPauls - could see a draw here! BEST PREDICTION OF ALL!

NOW COME ON GUYS YOU GOTTA GIVE ME SOME CREDIT HERE!
EVEN MR2 HAS TO CONCEDE THAT'S IMPRESSIVE?!

Dont be getting ahead of yourself there btdtgtt - look at your predictions, you picked all three of the big guns and home teams the rest of the way

Got flukey with the draw, I wouldnt be raiding the Paddy Power account just yet. 

[johnneycool]

Christ that was long!!! I had the DT's

aye and a ropey watch 

Cheeky fcuker!! I stopped my watch during game for any injuries so when it says 30 mins I usually blow time up, but the Dall keeper was slow taking frees late on and I added 1.32 for an injury late on. Canny win. decent game and Cushendall deserved to win

Only joking, the Dall were full value for the win and we could never close the 3-5 point gap in the second half, the late goal probably made it look a bit closer than it was, but I'd have to credit our lads, we'd 4 just out of minor and another just out of U-16 in the corner and they battled away rightly even though we'd one in corner forward and I don't remember him playing beyond No.4. in his juvenile days, but I'd rather get beat with young fella's learning their way than lads who'll never make it.

Another injury to probably our best defender on saturday, with Ben Toner getting a collapsed lung in a collision against Derry, another lad got married on Saturday and was out, plus one of our starting midfielders injured for a few weeks now. We just don't have any depth to the panel.

[btdtgtt]

Ballygalget V Cdall - Dall
Ballycran V Loughgiel - Shams
Portaferry V Dunloy - Dunloy

ALL THREE CORRECT!


3 really tough and interesting trips for the top3 here!
I am picking the 3 Antrim teams but none of these games would be a surprise if the Ards boys turned them over.

ALSO CORREEXT GIVEN HOW CLOSE GAMES WERE.

Ballycastle V St Johns - Town to win.
Glenarrife V Rossa
I will be at this if the weather holds up. Think Oisins recent win and Rossa's bad start plus disastrous record on the road makes me plump for Oisins by 4 or 5.

BOTH CORRECT

Sarsfields to beat Carey CORRECT
St Galls to beat Lamh Dearg CORRECT
Randalstwon to beat Gort DRAW
Armoy / StPauls - could see a draw here! BEST PREDICTION OF ALL!

NOW COME ON GUYS YOU GOTTA GIVE ME SOME CREDIT HERE!
EVEN MR2 HAS TO CONCEDE THAT'S IMPRESSIVE?!

Dont be getting ahead of yourself there btdtgtt - look at your predictions, you picked all three of the big guns and home teams the rest of the way

Got flukey with the draw, I wouldnt be raiding the Paddy Power account just yet. 

Ach come on NAG1!
Most people would have have fancied an Ards team to turn somebody over its hard to go down there.
Rossa won handy twice against Glenarrife last year but I got that call!
The Johnnies have a certain Tipp man up taking them but it didnt cause the Town any points.
And Div2 is always unpredicatable!
I even called a draw!
Be honest - that was a good weekend's predictions!
Nobody else made the calls!

Mind you - I dont think Paddy Power would be worried much either!

[NAG1]

Ballygalget V Cdall - Dall
Ballycran V Loughgiel - Shams
Portaferry V Dunloy - Dunloy

ALL THREE CORRECT!


3 really tough and interesting trips for the top3 here!
I am picking the 3 Antrim teams but none of these games would be a surprise if the Ards boys turned them over.

ALSO CORREEXT GIVEN HOW CLOSE GAMES WERE.

Ballycastle V St Johns - Town to win.
Glenarrife V Rossa
I will be at this if the weather holds up. Think Oisins recent win and Rossa's bad start plus disastrous record on the road makes me plump for Oisins by 4 or 5.

BOTH CORRECT

Sarsfields to beat Carey CORRECT
St Galls to beat Lamh Dearg CORRECT
Randalstwon to beat Gort DRAW
Armoy / StPauls - could see a draw here! BEST PREDICTION OF ALL!

NOW COME ON GUYS YOU GOTTA GIVE ME SOME CREDIT HERE!
EVEN MR2 HAS TO CONCEDE THAT'S IMPRESSIVE?!

Dont be getting ahead of yourself there btdtgtt - look at your predictions, you picked all three of the big guns and home teams the rest of the way

Got flukey with the draw, I wouldnt be raiding the Paddy Power account just yet. 

Ach come on NAG1!
Most people would have have fancied an Ards team to turn somebody over its hard to go down there.
Rossa won handy twice against Glenarrife last year but I got that call!
The Johnnies have a certain Tipp man up taking them but it didnt cause the Town any points.
And Div2 is always unpredicatable!
I even called a draw!
Be honest - that was a good weekend's predictions!
Nobody else made the calls!

Mind you - I dont think Paddy Power would be worried much either!

OK OK give us your predictions for the Euro Millions tonight since you are on such a roll 

Fact is the Ards teams had their best players all playing the day before in greater numbers than any of the big three so they were always going to struggle to get any result out of the three games.

St Johns are going to need some more fire power up front if they are going to challenge in the next few years. The possession game is nice to look at but hard to perfect and hard to maintain against the top teams.

[Milltown Row2]

Was slightly unfair on the the county players of both teams to play competitive games 2 days in a row NAG1, but what do you do?.

Dunloy had the biggest winning margin, away from home yesterday, against a team that's been fairly competitive over the years. So Dunloy going well. Thought Ballycran would have got a result yesterday on their tight pitch, less room for loughgiel to spread ball. Noticeable that all country teams scored twenty scores (Dunloy 1 short) Always a good indicator that the skill levels are starting to kick into gear.

The Div 2 teams that won only scored 13/14 scores, poor enough returns for what was a dry day, that's where they need to work on, the final third, scoring in these teams is usually done by 1/2 players which is bad craic in my view. More work needed to produce more scoring forwards

[NAG1]

Was slightly unfair on the the county players of both teams to play competitive games 2 days in a row NAG1, but what do you do?.

Dunloy had the biggest winning margin, away from home yesterday, against a team that's been fairly competitive over the years. So Dunloy going well. Thought Ballycran would have got a result yesterday on their tight pitch, less room for loughgiel to spread ball. Noticeable that all country teams scored twenty scores (Dunloy 1 short) Always a good indicator that the skill levels are starting to kick into gear.

The Div 2 teams that won only scored 13/14 scores, poor enough returns for what was a dry day, that's where they need to work on, the final third, scoring in these teams is usually done by 1/2 players which is bad craic in my view. More work needed to produce more scoring forwards

It wasnt a complaint MR2 was just an observation that the Ards lads were going to struggle without the depth of panel that the big 3 have.

Bit of decent weather would hopefully improve the games all round too.

[saffron89]

Very disappointing the Laois result. Think the talent ain't there

Only criticism I could direct at Ryan is the going back on closed panel

He deserves another couple of years. 

Is nelson now on his ticket

[Fairhead]

Very disappointing the Laois result. Think the talent ain't there

Only criticism I could direct at Ryan is the going back on closed panel

He deserves another couple of years. 

Is nelson now on his ticket

A number of people have taken issue (not having a go at you Saff89!) with Kevin Ryan and this thing about his closed panel comment when he started. So what? He probably made a mistake with the comment but move on for God sake its not really an issue. Any people i have talked to about him says hes a quiet man who is passionate and knows about hurling. Is that not what Antrim need?

As for last Saturday Laois were a better team, simple as. Willie Hyland and Zane Keenan in their half forward line are excellent hurlers. Joe Fitzpatrick was excellent too and did a good job in and around Neil McManus thus nullifying Antrim's only ball winner in the forwards. The thing about that is Kevin Ryan won't create ball winners in the next 2/3 years that work has to be done at club level.

[btdtgtt]

I mostly agree but:
How can that be done at club level when the club scene is treated with contempt to the point that there is no recognisable "season" as such which allows clubs to develop anything at all!

Only when our clubs are given a legitimate chance to develop will the rising tide lift the county boat.

[Milltown Row2]

Chicken and egg then.

[Fairhead]

I mostly agree but:
How can that be done at club level when the club scene is treated with contempt to the point that there is no recognisable "season" as such which allows clubs to develop anything at all!

Only when our clubs are given a legitimate chance to develop will the rising tide lift the county boat.

When i said club level i meant juvenile level. There arent loads of ball winning fowards in Antrim club teams good enough for intercounty level who arent getting the chance because theres not enough club games played!

Its all about the juvenile club level and the work thats put in there. This should then lead on to the better club talent going in to development squads where they will play with and against better players. Laois minors won handy enough in a Leinster minor qf before the senior game on Saturday and by all accounts their development squads have been competing well over the last year or two. Im sure that hard work will pay off in a few years with another Willie Hyland or Zane Keenan moving on to their senior squad. Antrim wont develop a competitive senior team just by playing club games every week.

[theskull1]

Antrim wont develop a competitive senior team just by playing club games every week.

And they wont develop when there isn't enough interested hurling men to drive the juvenile development properly. Dont expect any big change in our fortunes. We are where we are because we do not have a critical mass of real hurling people to do it any better than how it is done now. Our top senior clubs are as compeditive as clubs in any other county so we do somethings right but that quality isnt there in big numbers

[btdtgtt]

Chicken and egg then.

I dont think so MR2.
I genuinely believe that no county will be succesful on the national stage unless they have a vibrant club scene.

We have control over what we do within our club scene - masters of oud own destiny that way so to speak - so lets get it right. Lets have it in full flow and not held to ransom by a county manager or the minority/few people he picks (not a slant at Kevin Ryan).
Lets put the emphasis here - and see where it gets us. After all, the way things have been going has hardly been brining much success?!
If more clubs are playing more regular and meaningful games, then more players will come through the assembly line. Simples.

[theskull1]

WE are not masters of our own destiny

You need a critical mass of interested people first and then you need that the be organised well. Individuals or small cells do what they can.

[btdtgtt]

That doesnt contradict what I'm saying skull - we're still our own masters in terms of people being involved.
Perhaps if the club scene was more vibrant, less ad hoc, more people would be willing to give their time.