Galway v Mayo, CSFC May 20th

[blast05]

I would love to see him play at corner forward and stay there for the game, no fannying about out the field. He'd have to be worth 3 or 4 points a game if he was trying to score himself from close in rather than laying off the perfect pass.

I would disagree. MacD as an orthodox inside player would not win enough clean ball. He is not top class at winning ball in the air and against a teck tough corner back would struggle to win enough ball (although i guess if he won one in every 3 and converted them all it would be enough). When he gets on the ball out the pitch, it tends to be from a simple layoff handpass from a team mate

[AbbeySider]

I would disagree. MacD as an orthodox inside player would not win enough clean ball. He is not top class at winning ball in the air and against a teck tough corner back would struggle to win enough ball (although i guess if he won one in every 3 and converted them all it would be enough). When he gets on the ball out the pitch, it tends to be from a simple layoff handpass from a team mate

I would completely disagree with you there blast.
Firstly I think the word you are looking for is unorthodox.

Its outrageous to suggest that McD would not win enough ball. Everyone knows that he will win any 50-50 ball that comes his way and we can all remember him winning balls that he had no right to win. He has huge strength to hold off his marker in a tackle and to hold onto the ball.
(The All-Ireland semi final springs to mind when he won the ball sandwiched between Cullen and someone else. And he won another ball closer to the sideline and held it up to the dubs in a taunt because he had won possession and won the free... warms the soul)
 
Anyway you say McD would struggle under a high ball. I guarantee he would not because he played most of his underage football at mid-field with crossmolina. He is good in the air so I dont know what your basing your opinion on.

He would be very effective as a full forward in a target man role. He would win everything that would come his way and would pick out the other forwards very easily if he couldnt take his own scores.

I have often said on here that when he is centre forward our attack is too one dimensional because everything seems to go through him and we became predictable.

[An Gaeilgoir]

I would disagree. MacD as an orthodox inside player would not win enough clean ball. He is not top class at winning ball in the air and against a teck tough corner back would struggle to win enough ball (although i guess if he won one in every 3 and converted them all it would be enough). When he gets on the ball out the pitch, it tends to be from a simple layoff handpass from a team mate

I would completely disagree with you there blast.
Firstly I think the word you are looking for is unorthodox.

Its outrageous to suggest that McD would not win enough ball. Everyone knows that he will win any 50-50 ball that comes his way and we can all remember him winning balls that he had no right to win. He has huge strength to hold off his marker in a tackle and to hold onto the ball.
(The All-Ireland semi final springs to mind when he won the ball sandwiched between Cullen and someone else. And he won another ball closer to the sideline and held it up to the dubs in a taunt because he had won possession and won the free... warms the soul)
 
Anyway you say McD would struggle under a high ball. I guarantee he would not because he played most of his underage football at mid-field with crossmolina. He is good in the air so I dont know what your basing your opinion on.

He would be very effective as a full forward in a target man role. He would win everything that would come his way and would pick out the other forwards very easily if he couldnt take his own scores.

I have often said on here that when he is centre forward our attack is too one dimensional because everything seems to go through him and we became predictable.

But we really are lacking a quality number 11 who can win primary ball,and distribute it to the other forwards. However we have, i believe plenty of players to fill full forward. There is no doubt that MCD would be super at 14 but we would be really short at no. 11.

[IolarCoisCuain]

 

However we have, i believe plenty of players to fill full forward.

You might name them a Ghaeilgeoir. I thought Mayo have been struggling to find a full-foward since Jimmy Burke's day.

[stephenite]

Didn't McD play on the inside foreward line against Kerry in '05?? Think he is wasted in there and whilst he'll need to be told to let the ball in quicker I still feel he's better off on the 40.

[OirthearMhaigheo]

Didn't McD play on the inside foreward line against Kerry in '05?? Think he is wasted in there and whilst he'll need to be told to let the ball in quicker I still feel he's better off on the 40.

Amen to that. He could do a good job in the full-forward line, there's no doubting that, but why take the best centre-half forward in the country away from his best position? I think the league final really showed up how much we missed having him as a playmaker. Some say too much goes through him, but as the league final showed, it's better to have it that way than to have nobody at centre-forward to direct the play. My main concern would be that he won't be able for the physicality and energy required to play at no. 11 due to the long lay-off etc, and he may have to go in FF, time will tell I guess.

[AbbeySider]

But we really are lacking a quality number 11 who can win primary ball,and distribute it to the other forwards. However we have, i believe plenty of players to fill full forward. There is no doubt that MCD would be super at 14 but we would be really short at no. 11.

We need quality at number 11 and 14.
I would have O Neill at 11 and McDonald at 14. They could easily be switched during the game to change the style of the attack and confuse a defence.
Both great passers and have great peripheral vision for the cross field balls and both can read a game very well.


Stephenite,
I think you are referring to the '04 all Ireland Final against Kerry when McD was named in the full-forward line but was given a free role.


Edit: The role he was given allowed McD to play along the half forward line. The problem was that he was man marked out of the and our attack fell to pieces because we were so used to everything going through him. We need to be careful how much we use McD in that role because the better teams have copped on to it in the past. Again we were very one dimensional.

[OirthearMhaigheo]

Stephenite,
I think you are referring to the '04 all Ireland Final against Kerry when McD was named in the full-forward line but was given a free role.





[/quote]

no he actually played at FF, he gave McCarthy a torrid time aswell. Himself and Austin scored 11 pts between them that day I think. McD would work as a full forward, and O'Neill is the best alternative at 11 so I think we could see the 2 of them interchanging alright Abbeysider. What do you think about the Galway game, will we see McD make a cameo appearance? He's back very late so it's hard to see him having a big part to play if any part at all??

[stephenite]

Stephenite,
I think you are referring to the '04 all Ireland Final against Kerry when McD was named in the full-forward line but was given a free role.

I think I'm not, Mac D and Austin O'Malley played in the Full Forward line that day. While they both did very well, MacD was limited enough in terms of the influence one would expect from a player of his ability - bad call to have him there any day I feel.

Edit : Just checked that and he did score 3 points from play along with three frees. Still feel he's better at No.11

[larry buaile]

"McD played most of his underage football at midfield" - no he didn't.

I agree with blast, McD is not a ball winner (never has been) and that's why he doesn't like playing on the full forward line.

Half forward line is his best position, where he can tap over a few points, distribute to full forward line and free up one of his team mates (as there is always two lads marking him)

That's where and how he should be used, anything else is just daftness.

[AbbeySider]

What do you think about the Galway game, will we see McD make a cameo appearance? He's back very late so it's hard to see him having a big part to play if any part at all??

He may make an appearance. It would certainly lift the team to see him coming on. He is bound to be rusty and needs games but its hard to know whither he will be risked.

Does anyone know the team that went out against Kildare? I heard D Brady did very well.

[AbbeySider]

"McD played most of his underage football at midfield" - no he didn't.

My apologies,
I was certain that McDonald was midfield in an U-21 county final around 1997. (not sure the exact year)

[Tubberman]

Does anyone know the team that went out against Kildare? I heard D Brady did very well.

I wasn't at the game myself, but Kenneth O'Malley made his comeback in goal. David Clarke has a hamstring injury and is a doubt for Galway match (I'd have O'Malley as no.1 anyway).
BJP was played at full-back - didn't hear how he fared in that position.

T Mort played and worked hard, but was v rusty and didn't use the ball all that well, but that's to be expected. He hasn't had a consistent run in over a year. 
Great to see Brady back and he did pretty well - he'll be a definite starter assuming he can stay fit for a few weeks!
Liam O'Malley didn't play because he also has a hamstring injury - not sure how serious it is.
The squad were in Kildare for the whole weekend. Ciaran Mc was at the match, but wasn't togged.
Looks unlikely he'll play a part against Galway if he couldn't play a few mins of a challenge match.

[the Deel Rover]

"McD played most of his underage football at midfield" - no he didn't.

My apologies,
I was certain that McDonald was midfield in an U-21 county final around 1997. (not sure the exact year)

Your right abbeysider he did play midfied for cross at underage level,he was there for the minors that  got back to back county titles in the early 90's.
However Mc D is not a full forward never was and never will be his best position is in the half forward line , i'm sure conor missed Mc D not playing for the league campaign for the quality of ball he gives in to the corner forwards, i know people say that he slows the game down but i'm sure the corner forwards would rather quality ball going into them rather than high ball been pumped into the full forward line.
There is no way that he will be fit to start against galway but what a player to be able to bring on as a sub,he rarely has a bad game against the auld enemy. 

[Maradona]

McDonald on the 40 is obvious that he is best suited there, but we have to face it that we are going nowhere fast if we revert with him at No11. The face is that it DOES slow down the mayo game which is already slow when he is not playing. Otherwide if we do play him at 11 the rest of the team must not revert to  putting the ball through him almost every time. At stages last year (esp v Dublin) others were taking greater responsibility and it worked well. Unfortunately when we were in trouble in the final, most were looking for McD again.
In my opinion a good footballer can adapt to any position and I would like to see him playing closer to goal. Unfortunally No13 would be the place, but C Mort needs to be there. We have no chance if we keep relying on Mort for scores - with McD our only other natural scoring forward, we have to start getting 3-4 points per game from him. I would disagree somewhat with what type of ball forwards like....whatever is the best ball they would like, the worst is to get a ball while being closely marked at the end of a painfully long build-up - even the best forwards would struggle to score with so little space. As a corner back in my time, I hated quick ball in from mid-feild as the corner forward was normally faster and smarter! Thankfully for me at underage, the best players playing through the middle tended to hold onto the ball thus giving me loads of opportunity to get alongside the forward and break up the ball when it eventually got to him via a hand pass. The forward was usually left cursing and frustrated that he did not get the early ball! Unfortunately mayo seem to play the same way a lot of the time. Even with a high ball in to a 'small' FF line - any player worth his salt should be able to contest what is after all a 50 / 50 ball - we also seem to struggle to do this at times also. I would be reasonably happy with progress this year, but we seriously need to modify out tactics. All are talking about our issues in the backs, but I think we have greater problems at the moment in attack (only conceded 0-12 on ave in the league, however only scored 1-10 on average)