Down Club Hurling & Football

[corn02]

Cheers Samster.

[supersub]

Are all the div 1 matchs bar the 2 in rostrevor and castlewellen def on tonight?

Why is Castlewellan game off? Do you know when its refixed for?

Is the castlewellen and clonduff game not meant to be on monday night? 3rd Aug?

[umpire]

Castlewellan is due to play Burren tonight and also on Monday they play Clonduff in an outstaniding game that was cancelled in June

Castlewellan to get 4 points ?

[supersub]

My bad sorry! And 4 easy points at that...

[Mid Down Gael]

Castlewellan is due to play Burren tonight and also on Monday they play Clonduff in an outstaniding game that was cancelled in June

Castlewellan to get 4 points ?

If they get one they will be doing well. Their form badly dipped before holidays. Think they lost 3 on the throt.

[Town Gael]

The Town lost 3 on the trot but should have won at least 2 of them- hit 9 wides in the first half against Saval and 11 wides in the first half against the Stone, you can't win games with stats like that

[Tomorrow is another day]

Management Selection

This is a crucial juncture in our County's recent history and the wrong selection now could set back our senior team for many years.

The most successful counties over the last 15 years since our last triumph have all evolved towards a system whereby the coach is most seperate and distinct from the manager. The coach takes training, gets players fit and works on skills while the manager deals with strategy and crucially communication. The two front runners Pete and wee James have styles that unfortunately do not fall into one category or the other and are blends of both positions. I would even go further and say that Pete is not an intercounty manager per se but rather an excellent coach. However he is not a manager as he is a very poor person to person and group communicator. He is functional and factual like a GPS system!

Take a look at Dublin and Pat Gilroy. He seems to have gone further than anyone else in this intercounty "new manager" model. Upto his appointment, Tyrone (Harte and Tally) Armagh (Kernan and Grimley) Kerry (O'Connor and Finnegan) seemed to be the front runners in creating a new job description for an Inter county manager. They abdicated responsibility for fitness and basic coaching and involved most of their time in strategy, managing resource, PR, pyschology etc. Even the great Micko has been doing likewise over the last 5 or so years with Arthur French. But Gilroy's appointment went a step further. Pat Gilroy is a very successful Chief Executive of the Irish division of a French Multinational. He should not have the spare time to manage any county team let alone Dublin. But he brings a professionalism and strategy to the role. His sole task is to allocate resource and identify need and determine strategy. He has replicated his model for business success to the dressing room. He is most definitely not working out drills!!

We need to read the writing on the wall. We need to embrace the professional business like approaches to management and organisational development and motivation. Simply appointing an ex manager or ex player is not enough. As Einstein is famously quoted as saying "If you always do what you have always done then you will always get what you have always got!"

I would like to see a radical rethink as to how our county senior team is managed based on the best practices of Organisational Development Research.

I would like to see a significant overhaul of our development structures so that we are putting in the foundations for continued future success from 10 year olds up within Down.

Though most crucially I would like to see an overhaul of the administration of the Down County association. There are simply too many people who are in executive positions with insufficient intellectual ability and even worse many are going through the motions and not serving the best interests of their membership in the county. The great breakthrough was started in the late 50's by the visionary involvement of Maurice Hayes as county secretary. We need another such talent. The present incumbent is simply not upto the task and should resign in the best interests of the county.

Jack Devanney is one of the few if only people on the County Executive at present with true ability. The Longford native is a great administrator and needs to have more likeminded capable and honest people with him to make a difference for this great county of ours.

This county needs courage. This county needs new blood at administrative level and this great county needs to get the job description right first before it looks for the best manager. Finally the successful person then needs to have the confidence in his county board and the freedom to put whatever structures he needs in place to maximise the return form the players that we have.

[Blue Island]

Management Selection

This is a crucial juncture in our County's recent history and the wrong selection now could set back our senior team for many years.

The most successful counties over the last 15 years since our last triumph have all evolved towards a system whereby the coach is most seperate and distinct from the manager. The coach takes training, gets players fit and works on skills while the manager deals with strategy and crucially communication. The two front runners Pete and wee James have styles that unfortunately do not fall into one category or the other and are blends of both positions. I would even go further and say that Pete is not an intercounty manager per se but rather an excellent coach. However he is not a manager as he is a very poor person to person and group communicator. He is functional and factual like a GPS system!

You obviously do not ember much about 1994. Pete McGrath does have a blend of both coaching and managing, as do most managers. However, he was well capable and astute to delegate much of the coaching to Pat O'Hare RIP, probably the best coach in Down at the time.

[Tomorrow is another day]

Blue Island - I remember 1993-94 season extremely well as I observed it from close quarters.

Pat was a very good coach while Pete tried to perform a more "strategic" role but this was significantly hampered by his poor communication skills. Remember wee James and Greg went on strike that winter due mainly to said communication faults!

Pete is an excellent coach and football man himself but not a manager as defined by modern intercounty standards

[Blue Island]

Blue Island - I remember 1993-94 season extremely well as I observed it from close quarters.

Pat was a very good coach while Pete tried to perform a more "strategic" role but this was significantly hampered by his poor communication skills. Remember wee James and Greg went on strike that winter due mainly to said communication faults!

Pete is an excellent coach and football man himself but not a manager as defined by modern intercounty standards

Nearly mad, I was not advocating Pete McGrath as manager, though I don't believe he would be bad choice. I would be torn between McCartan and McIver myself. After the near mutiny in 94 at least McGrath listened/relented to the players problems to a degree, otherwise he would have been out of a job then.

Tommorrow is another day, seemed to suggest that McGrath was incapable of working with an authoritative coach and that is not wholly true.

[Blue Island]

Sorry nearlymad, the above was obviously in reply to tomorrow is another day.

[Mid Down Gael]

Kilcoo v Saval postponed due to the awful weather. This country is a disaster, end of July and having to postpone games because off rain.

[goldenyears]

Clone beating harps by 6 almost full time

Harps brutal away from home

[umpire]

Full-time Liatriom 1.8 Mayobridge 1.16

Half-time Liatriom 1.6 Mayobridge 0.6

[Bitta-Banter]

Darragh Cross 0-12 Ballymartin 1-04