Gaaboard team of the last 25 years

[Rav67]

Where is Fearon these days?

The Irish News have a small section each day in the paper where they print about 6 or 8 tweets from people's twitter accounts the day before.  They are usually from politicians or bloggers, but Tony Fearon bizarrely seems to feature a couple of times a week.

[Farrandeelin]

Fearon is busy on facebook too.

[bcarrier]

Starting with the easiest position I would say midfield has two outstanding candidates. Anthony Tohill was a phenomenon and I can't imagine a single team in history that he wouldn't get in to. Next to him the one player in eh last ten years or so that never seemed to lose a midfield battle was Darragh O Se.

So I'd defo have Tohill & O Se as the two midfielders.

Darragh O'Sé only came into his own when the likes of McDermott, Tohill, Walsh, Stynes, Buckley, McHale etc. were in their twilight years or gone altogether.
If you put Darragh in his prime up against John McDermott or Tohill he wouldn't catch a single ball.
He played his best football in an era where the midfield landscape changed considerably as the nordies started flooding it with bodies.
More often than not Darragh just had to battle swarms of angry midgets (you know who you are).

McGrane, Whelan and Nicholas Murphy  gave him loads to think about along with the midges. He is still probably my favourite footballer ever though. A heavyweight who never dodged  a fight.

[Armaghgael]

Oisin McConville is a shoe in

[RedandGreenSniper]

Love these debates. Picking a team of the last 20 years is fraught with peril but no one is going to get a team everyone agrees on.

I'd go for the following:

Stephen Cluxton
Martin O'Connell Darren Fay Marc O Se
Tomas O Se Seamus Moynihan Philip Jordan
Darragh O Se Anthony Tohill
Declan O'Sullivan Padraig Joyce Graham Geraghty
Colm Cooper Peter Canavan Maurice Fitzgerald

[ONeill]

Love these debates. Picking a team of the last 20 years is fraught with peril but no one is going to get a team everyone agrees on.

I'd go for the following:

Stephen Cluxton
Martin O'Connell Darren Fay Marc O Se
Tomas O Se Seamus Moynihan Philip Jordan
Darragh O Se Anthony Tohill
Declan O'Sullivan Padraig Joyce Graham Geraghty
Colm Cooper Peter Canavan Maurice Fitzgerald

No Tyrone hat on but I think you cannot leave Sean Cavanagh out, maybe at Geraghty's expense?

[passedit]

Love these debates. Picking a team of the last 20 years is fraught with peril but no one is going to get a team everyone agrees on.

I'd go for the following:

Stephen Cluxton
Martin O'Connell Darren Fay Marc O Se
Tomas O Se Seamus Moynihan Philip Jordan
Darragh O Se Anthony Tohill
Declan O'Sullivan Padraig Joyce Graham Geraghty
Colm Cooper Peter Canavan Maurice Fitzgerald

No Tyrone hat on but I think you cannot leave Sean Cavanagh out, maybe at Geraghty's expense?

Where are Tony Scullion, Henry Downey, Greg Blaney, Martin Mc Hugh, James jnr, Mickey Linden, John O Leary?

[Hardy]

Love these debates. Picking a team of the last 20 years is fraught with peril but no one is going to get a team everyone agrees on.

I'd go for the following:

Stephen Cluxton
Martin O'Connell Darren Fay Marc O Se
Tomas O Se Seamus Moynihan Philip Jordan
Darragh O Se Anthony Tohill
Declan O'Sullivan Padraig Joyce Graham Geraghty
Colm Cooper Peter Canavan Maurice Fitzgerald

No Tyrone hat on but I think you cannot leave Sean Cavanagh out, maybe at Geraghty's expense?

You cannot be serious. You can NOT be serious. Geraghty is the complete, sublime gaelic footballer. Cavanagh has done OK for a slightly awkward, ungainly fellow.

[ONeill]

You cannot be serious. You can NOT be serious. Geraghty is the complete, sublime gaelic footballer. Cavanagh has done OK for a slightly awkward, ungainly fellow.

Cavanagh wouldn't score a poofy goal like this - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xxs_ta-Pjcc

[Sea The Stars]

1991 - 2011, I will say this:

1) Stephen Cluxton - Dublin

2) Seamus Moynihan - Kerry
3) Darren Fay - Meath
4) Sean Marty Lockhart - Derry

5) Paul Curran - Dublin
6) Keiran McGeeney - Armagh
7) Sean Og De Paor - Galway

John McDermott - Meath
9) Dara O'Se - Kerry

10) Trevor Giles - Meath
11) Ciaran McDonald - Mayo
12) Graham Geraghty - Meath

13) Colm Cooper - Kerry
14) Peter Canavan - Tyrone
15) Maurice Fitzgerald - Kerry

Four Meath players vs one Tyrone dosen't reflect Tyrone's dominance in the latter half of the 1991-2011 period.

Same with Kerry with only O'Se and Cooper from their noughties teams in the final line-up.

Still, the four Meath players were exceptional and are as good as anything that Meath have ever produced.

The two players who I had most difficulty omitting were Padraic Joyce and Ollie Murphy. 

Other players who I considered (in no particular order):
Goalkeeper: John O'Leary.
Defence: Marc O'Se, Keiren McKeever, Philip Jordan, Tomas O'Se, Conor Gormely, Paddy Christie, Cathal Daly, Mark O'Reilly.
Midfielders: Ciaran Whelan, Anthony Tohill, Sean Cavanagh, Paddy Keenan, Niall Buckley, Michael Donnellan.
Forwards: Padraic Joyce, Ollie Murphy, Tommy Dowd, Stephen O'Neill, Brian McGuigan, James McCartan, Mickey Linden, Declan O'Sullivan, Ja Fallon, Stephen McDonnell, Ger Cavlan.

[Sea The Stars]

I should probably explain the inclusion of Keenan in such esteemed company.

An exceptional midfielder and has been the best in Ireland in the last 3/4 years.

And I'm from Meath !! He is without player one player who's career will probably never get the credit it deserves.

[RedandGreenSniper]

Love these debates. Picking a team of the last 20 years is fraught with peril but no one is going to get a team everyone agrees on.

I'd go for the following:

Stephen Cluxton
Martin O'Connell Darren Fay Marc O Se
Tomas O Se Seamus Moynihan Philip Jordan
Darragh O Se Anthony Tohill
Declan O'Sullivan Padraig Joyce Graham Geraghty
Colm Cooper Peter Canavan Maurice Fitzgerald

No Tyrone hat on but I think you cannot leave Sean Cavanagh out, maybe at Geraghty's expense?

Where are Tony Scullion, Henry Downey, Greg Blaney, Martin Mc Hugh, James jnr, Mickey Linden, John O Leary?

Possibly in relation to Cavanagh but I was a big fan of Geraghty myself. Would have him in any team. Blaney and Mickey Linden are decent shouts too, possibly for Gooch and O'Sullivan but both those two are going to get better and will have those spots nailed down in time. As I see it they have them now but others may not agree. I may be more biased towards last fifteen years in my selection admittedly.
And as for the few Tyronies on board, it is not a selection based on team's success but individuals brilliance over the period of time. Tyrone were the archetypal team, with any amount of guys who would be in contention but few enough who ever had to be dominate games in order for them to progress. That's possibly one reason why Canavan is so well regarded, because he carried Tyrone on his own at times in the 1990s. The likes of Stephen O'Neill never had to do that. Not making an argument for O'Neill being better than Canavan but merely pointing out that guys who needed to sparkle all the time will be more acclaimed.

[saffronandblue]

Find it hard to believe that James Nallen is not even been considered for these teams.  If he was from Kerry he would have a s**t load of all Irelands and an even greater number of all stars to his name.  Mcgeeney was good and Curran might have looked flashy but James Nallen stood tall in many a Mayo team that collapsed all around him.

[RedandGreenSniper]

Find it hard to believe that James Nallen is not even been considered for these teams.  If he was from Kerry he would have a s**t load of all Irelands and an even greater number of all stars to his name.  Mcgeeney was good and Curran might have looked flashy but James Nallen stood tall in many a Mayo team that collapsed all around him.

I gave him serious consideration but went for Moynihan. Nallen was a class act too though and there were a lot of fine centre-half backs in the period under questions. Moynihan was, in my opinion, the best defender of the modern era. You could play Nallen on the wing I guess.

[johnpower]

1991 - 2011, I will say this:

1) Stephen Cluxton - Dublin

2) Seamus Moynihan - Kerry
3) Darren Fay - Meath
4) Sean Marty Lockhart - Derry

5) Paul Curran - Dublin
6) Keiran McGeeney - Armagh
7) Sean Og De Paor - Galway

John McDermott - Meath
9) Dara O'Se - Kerry

10) Trevor Giles - Meath
11) Ciaran McDonald - Mayo
12) Graham Geraghty - Meath

13) Colm Cooper - Kerry
14) Peter Canavan - Tyrone
15) Maurice Fitzgerald - Kerry

Four Meath players vs one Tyrone dosen't reflect Tyrone's dominance in the latter half of the 1991-2011 period.

Same with Kerry with only O'Se and Cooper from their noughties teams in the final line-up.

Still, the four Meath players were exceptional and are as good as anything that Meath have ever produced.

The two players who I had most difficulty omitting were Padraic Joyce and Ollie Murphy. 

Other players who I considered (in no particular order):
Goalkeeper: John O'Leary.
Defence: Marc O'Se, Keiren McKeever, Philip Jordan, Tomas O'Se, Conor Gormely, Paddy Christie, Cathal Daly, Mark O'Reilly.
Midfielders: Ciaran Whelan, Anthony Tohill, Sean Cavanagh, Paddy Keenan, Niall Buckley, Michael Donnellan.
Forwards: Padraic Joyce, Ollie Murphy, Tommy Dowd, Stephen O'Neill, Brian McGuigan, James McCartan, Mickey Linden, Declan O'Sullivan, Ja Fallon, Stephen McDonnell, Ger Cavlan.