Derry Club Football & Hurling original

[Estimator]

You might want to read the posts carefully before frothing at the mouth.  It was myself, not Screenexile who posted the article from Donnelly.  As well as that, I did give an opinion above the article, clearly stating that I believed Donnelly just wanted the opportunity for lads who are U20 to be able to play county football.  Other counties have been affected as well. 

Kudos on your brilliant sense of humour for changing 'Screen to Draperstown, very similar to those hilarious Tyrone folk who insist on calling Derry  ******Derry. Big GAA man?

I'd suggest that the Derry U20 boss is picking from the following teams from the last few years.  There is a decent amount of players there with some cross over between school, club and county.  Some of those fellas will be overage now for the U20s.  Some may have lost interest. Some have been fallen down the pecking order, or not cut out for county football. Some are enjoying life at uni, work, abroad etc. Some are overage for minor and are missing out on county football as they are still playing with their school.

Derry v Monaghan 2018 – Ulster Minor Final (U17)
Derry: Aidan Gillan, Conan Milne, Tiarnan Woods, Ronan McFaul, Aidan McCluskey, Johnny McErlain, Adam Canavan, Niall Doyle, Iarlaith Donaghy, Eunan McElhennon, Shea Murray, Ethan Doherty, Eoghan Hawe, Enda Downey, Conleth McGuckin
Subs: PJ McAleese for S Murray (41), Dara Mooney for A Canavan (49), Sean Kearney for E Hawe (55).

MacRory Cup Semi-Final 2018 – Maghera v Convent
St Mary's: O Lynch; C Doyle, G Lupari, L óg McElhone; J Crawford, S McErlain 1-0, J McCann; R Keenan, T Donaghy 1-0; D Bradley 1-3, 1-0 pen, 0-3 frees, T McAteer 0-2, 0-1 free, C Devlin; L Quinn 1-1, C Murphy 1-0, J McErlain.
Subs: D McAteer for D Bradley (46), A McCluskey for R Keenan (53), C O'Neill 0-1 for L Quinn

St Patrick's Maghera: N McNicholl, T McCusker, T Walsh, C McShane 0-1, D McNicholl, O McGill, P McLaughlin, O McWilliams, J McAtamney 0-1 free, E Mulholland, R Mullan, D McLaughlin, A Doherty 1-4, 1-0 pen, L McWilliams 0-7, 0-6 frees, T McHugh.
Subs: E Hawe for T McCusker (HT), E Doherty for T McHugh (38), PJ McAleese for E Mulholland (47)

Ulster Minor Club Final - 2018
St Colm's, Ballinascreen: R Scullion; D McCoy, C Doyle, R McKenna; R Doyle, A Bradley, Conal Logan; M Bradley (0-1), Christopher Logan; E McBride (0-1), C McAlinden, C Donnelly (0-2, 0-1 free); E Duggan, N Rafferty (0-2 frees), R McSorley.
Subs used: M Farrelly; D Kelly.

Ulster Minor Club Final - 2019
Bellaghy: D McErlean; R McFaul, C McLarnon, J Diamond; P McErlean, C Milne, O Lee; C McShane (3-0), K Friel(1-1); O McErlean (1-1), L Spier (0-5), L Brady; C Diamond (0-1 free), P Cassidy (1-2), R Lee (0-1 free).
Subs: O McClafferty for McLarnon (50), D Palframan for O Lee (55), S Turner for C Diamond (57), F Murray for Spier (60)

Ulster Minor Club Final - 2020
Lavey: J Scullion, Joe Duggan, S O'Neill, S Melaugh, N Duggan, R Farrell, R McGill, C Collins, Jamie Duggan (0-02), P McGuck (0-01), J McGurk (0-02), R McGill, C Downey (0-02), E Downey, M Downey (0-02f)

MacRory 2020
St Mary's Magherafelt: P McKinney; F Diamond, M McNeill, S McSorley; E McEvoy (0-1); C Mallon (0-1), J McErlain, A McCluskey (0-2); E Quinn, D Higgins (1-1); E McElhennon (0-1), R McKenna (0-4, frees), S Duffin; C Johnston (0-1), K McNicholl (0-1).
Subs: R McEldowney for E Quinn (47), C Ormsby (1-0) for S Duffin (55), C Crozier for K McNicholl (70), J McVey for R McKenna (72), C Fowley for C Mallon (79).

St Patrick's Maghera: Z Scullion, P McLaughlin, A McLaughlin, O McClafferty, S O'Neill, C Mullan, PJ McAleese, S McKearney, T Higgins, S Murray, E Doherty (0-2), C Diamond (0-1, 1F), S Kearney (0-4, 3F), M Dixon, C Higgins (2-2).
Subs: M Downey for Diamond, J McGurk for McAleese, S Cassidy for Dixon, L Downey for T Higgins, J McWilliams for Murray, C Chambers for C Higgins

2020 U20 Team v Fermanagh
Derry:
Ryan Scullion – Ballinascreen 2018
James Diamond – Bellaghy 2019
Tiarnán Walsh – St Patrick's Maghera 2018
Odhrán McLarnon - ?
Eunan Mulholland (0-2) - St Patrick's Maghera 2018
Iarlaith Donaghy – Derry Minor 2018
Aidan McCluskey – Derry Minor 2018 / St Mary's Magherafelt 2018/20
Kealan Friel (0-1) - Bellaghy 2019
Conleth McShane – St. Patrick's Maghera 2018 / Bellaghy 2019
Niall Doyle – Derry Minor 2018 / Ballinascreen 2018
Fintan Bradley - Lavey u21 Ulster Finalist 2018
Conleth McGuckin – Derry Minor 2018
Cormac Murphy – St Mary's Magherafelt 2018
Jude McAtamney – St Patrick's Maghera 2018
Tiarnán McHugh – St Patrick's Maghera 2018
SUBS:
Alex Doherty (0-5) – St Patrick's Maghera 2018
Oran Downey - Lavey u21 Ulster Finalist 2018
Noel Rafferty  - Ballinascreen 2018

Donnelly is not talking about 16 or 17 year olds.  He is talking about the 18 (almost 19) year old lads who won't play county football this year because of the fixture congestion. But you feel free to rant on my friend.

[TotesEmosh]

 

[bannside]

Estimator you've certainly done your homework there alright. Tosh is winking at you now so I think that's him settled down now for a while. There was me thinking he was having a wee dig at Antrim too thinking he was going to get a gather up of available club players to bate us, and him not really thinking that at all!

[Keyser soze]

Who would be the players on the St Marys or Maghera teams that would make the cut on an U20 panel let alone be a nailed on starter, you would imagine it would take an exceptional player to be in this bracket let alone 8 even if those schools had exceptional teams. Don't see how MacRory could have a massive influence on U 20 progress.

[Rawhide]

Who would be the players on the St Marys or Maghera teams that would make the cut on an U20 panel let alone be a nailed on starter, you would imagine it would take an exceptional player to be in this bracket let alone 8 even if those schools had exceptional teams. Don't see how MacRory could have a massive influence on U 20 progress.

St Pats, Doherty from Glen and Mc Faul from Bellaghy. Convent Mc Closkey are three stand outs. Additionally you have Mc Carron and Cassidy injured, two serious scoring forwards

[Keyser soze]

Who would be the players on the St Marys or Maghera teams that would make the cut on an U20 panel let alone be a nailed on starter, you would imagine it would take an exceptional player to be in this bracket let alone 8 even if those schools had exceptional teams. Don't see how MacRory could have a massive influence on U 20 progress.

St Pats, Doherty from Glen and Mc Faul from Bellaghy. Convent Mc Closkey are three stand outs. Additionally you have Mc Carron and Cassidy injured, two serious scoring forwards

Those are good players named but none of them are a Dermot McNicholl or an Anthony Tohill which is the type of standout you need to be to play U20 when still at school. And its a long way off the 8-10 players Donnelly is saying he would like to have available to him from MacRory teams.

[JoG2]

Who would be the players on the St Marys or Maghera teams that would make the cut on an U20 panel let alone be a nailed on starter, you would imagine it would take an exceptional player to be in this bracket let alone 8 even if those schools had exceptional teams. Don't see how MacRory could have a massive influence on U 20 progress.

St Pats, Doherty from Glen and Mc Faul from Bellaghy. Convent Mc Closkey are three stand outs. Additionally you have Mc Carron and Cassidy injured, two serious scoring forwards

Those are good players named but none of them are a Dermot McNicholl or an Anthony Tohill which is the type of standout you need to be to play U20 when still at school. And its a long way off the 8-10 players Donnelly is saying he would like to have available to him from MacRory teams.

Very good players who would most likely have made the team, and players Donnelly would have wanted to fit into his system of play. The 2018 Ulster winning team was a very young team, I'm sure a good few were still @ MacRory level. And when did we jump to 8-10 players?

[lenny]

Who would be the players on the St Marys or Maghera teams that would make the cut on an U20 panel let alone be a nailed on starter, you would imagine it would take an exceptional player to be in this bracket let alone 8 even if those schools had exceptional teams. Don't see how MacRory could have a massive influence on U 20 progress.

St Pats, Doherty from Glen and Mc Faul from Bellaghy. Convent Mc Closkey are three stand outs. Additionally you have Mc Carron and Cassidy injured, two serious scoring forwards

Those are good players named but none of them are a Dermot McNicholl or an Anthony Tohill which is the type of standout you need to be to play U20 when still at school. And its a long way off the 8-10 players Donnelly is saying he would like to have available to him from MacRory teams.

A good number of those players would only have one more year of u20. Are you seriously trying to say that somebody in their 2nd last year of u20 couldn't be an influential player? For example Ethan Doherty would be a massive player for the u20 county team.

[oakleaflad]

Who would be the players on the St Marys or Maghera teams that would make the cut on an U20 panel let alone be a nailed on starter, you would imagine it would take an exceptional player to be in this bracket let alone 8 even if those schools had exceptional teams. Don't see how MacRory could have a massive influence on U 20 progress.

St Pats, Doherty from Glen and Mc Faul from Bellaghy. Convent Mc Closkey are three stand outs. Additionally you have Mc Carron and Cassidy injured, two serious scoring forwards

Those are good players named but none of them are a Dermot McNicholl or an Anthony Tohill which is the type of standout you need to be to play U20 when still at school. And its a long way off the 8-10 players Donnelly is saying he would like to have available to him from MacRory teams.

Ethan Doherty played U20 last year, he'd be a big addition. I think they've a few more injured as well. Paul Cassidy and Fergal Mortimer are injured.
This group didn't really get to play minor together as it was the year they played both U17 and U18. Most of our better U17's were with the U18's that year from memory.

[screenexile]

Why do people think you shouldn't be playing U20 when still at school . . . the majority of lads in U6th would be in their first year of U20 so there's a fair chunk of them who could make the grade!!!

[Keyser soze]

So our County U20 team are reliant on 6-8 school children to be competitive? The Antrim game on Saturday should be a good watch at least by that reckoning.

Nope, Donnelly would like to play lads that are eligible to play U-20 football.  If you did a bit of research you'd see that Derry are not the only county affected.


DERRY'S U20 football manager Mickey Donnelly says the GAA fixtures calendar should be "shredded" and believes there are too many "battlefields" at underage level for the relatively new football grade to flourish.

With the schools sector and U20 grade effectively pitted against one another over player availability and high-profile fixture clashes, Donnelly says the current template "needs ripped up".

Due to fixture changes at national level, the Ulster Council was forced to bring forward its U20 Football Championship by a couple of months, to February, but the move has spectacularly collided with 'A' and 'B' post-primary competitions.

Once the GAA granted Fermanagh special dispensation to call upon their 13 school-tied players to field in order for the Ernemen to field at U20 level, other counties made similar requests.

Derry and Fermanagh get the U20 Football Championship ball rolling at Celtic Park this Saturday but with St Patrick's, Maghera and St Mary's, Magherafelt involved in MacRory Cup action next Tuesday and Wednesday, Donnelly won't be able to call up those players.

"The irony is if you asked me that question: did I think the U20s was working, before Christmas and before the fixtures came out I would have said it's working.

"We'd a couple of decent years: we won one Ulster title and got to an Ulster final last year and the timing of the competition and that summer window seemed to work well. But, to bring it into the schools [calendar] is just a total disaster. It's just a maelstrom of in-house fights and wranglings.

"It's not the calendar needs 'tweaked'; it needs ripped up, you need to a get shredder from somewhere and to start again because it's definitely not working."

Donnelly says it would have been wrong to put players involved in MacRory Cup football under pressure to line out for Derry's U20 footballers as well.

"Even though the rule [allowing counties to call up school-tied players for U20 duty] is relaxed we haven't had the schools players simply because we haven't put the pressure on them.

"It's difficult to have a player at the end of a barrel of a gun and force that on them... Surely, inter-county football is the pinnacle for anybody and we're actually depriving these lads of inter-county football.

"I come from a very, very small club [Aghaloo, Co Tyrone] and the pride that we feel when someone from our club, our tribe, goes and represents their county, it's huge. But now what people are saying is: 'Let's make it a development competition, so any Tom, Dick and Harry can play inter-county football.'

"It just diminishes the entire competition."

Now in his third year with the Derry U20s, Donnelly feels that the now defunct U21 grade was the definitely the lesser of two evils.

"[At U21] You were relying on a very, very good relationship with your senior county manager, which doesn't exist in every county. But it would definitely be better than this because it's anarchy.

"I would like to have eight or nine lads available to me on Saturday who are involved in MacRory. If it was U21, you might have one stand-out player. If you go through teams that have won Hogan Cups – Fermanagh teams, Tyrone teams, Derry teams – how many of those lads were playing U21 football? Very few."

The fact that St Michael's, Enniskillen exited the MacRory Cup to Holy Trinity, Cookstown at the end of last month means that the Ernemen U20s will have a full deck to choose from in facing Derry this weekend.

Donnelly explained: "A county like Fermanagh might have 11 or 12 St Michael's Enniskillen boys on the panel. If St Michael's had beaten Holy Trinity, Fermanagh mightn't have been able to field [against us]."

The currently education system in the north also has a negative impact on the U20 grade, as Donnelly said: "I think the point that has been missed here is that it really hurts the six counties more than anywhere else. It's more pronounced, more than say: St Brendan's Killarney, St Jarlath's, Tuam, Coláiste Chríost Rí...invariably, those schools don't enforce transition year, so lads leave schools football at 18-years-of-age; we have them until 19.

"So why would the Galway delegate or the Mayo delegate care about this, or the Donegal delegate for that matter? But it definitely affects us because we have lads that are doing A2 exams at nearly 19-years-of-age who are ready-made U20 footballers. You could argue they are ready-made senior footballers, but because the nature and the timing of the competition we can't play them.

"Surely to God, U20 was created because it was felt U21 was too big a bridge between 18 to 21.

"We've now nothing between 17 and senior because these players can't play, a lot of my best players can't play because they're with their schools, and rightly so. But we're depriving them the chance of playing inter-county football which is madness."

"What's been the clash in the calendar over the last number of years? It's been club versus county. So, at least if you kept 17s, 20s, and seniors all playing their games in the summer window, then clubs can deal with that because they know when they're not going to have their players, whereas now schools are flexing, counties are trying to flex. It's just a battlefield."

I took this as being a direct quote from Donnelly. [in response to JOG's question]

[TotesEmosh]

Caml down lads sure its only aul U20's anyways 

[restorepride]

You might want to read the posts carefully before frothing at the mouth.  It was myself, not Screenexile who posted the article from Donnelly.  As well as that, I did give an opinion above the article, clearly stating that I believed Donnelly just wanted the opportunity for lads who are U20 to be able to play county football.  Other counties have been affected as well. 

Kudos on your brilliant sense of humour for changing 'Screen to Draperstown, very similar to those hilarious Tyrone folk who insist on calling Derry  ******Derry. Big GAA man?

I'd suggest that the Derry U20 boss is picking from the following teams from the last few years.  There is a decent amount of players there with some cross over between school, club and county.  Some of those fellas will be overage now for the U20s.  Some may have lost interest. Some have been fallen down the pecking order, or not cut out for county football. Some are enjoying life at uni, work, abroad etc. Some are overage for minor and are missing out on county football as they are still playing with their school.

Derry v Monaghan 2018 – Ulster Minor Final (U17)
Derry: Aidan Gillan, Conan Milne, Tiarnan Woods, Ronan McFaul, Aidan McCluskey, Johnny McErlain, Adam Canavan, Niall Doyle, Iarlaith Donaghy, Eunan McElhennon, Shea Murray, Ethan Doherty, Eoghan Hawe, Enda Downey, Conleth McGuckin
Subs: PJ McAleese for S Murray (41), Dara Mooney for A Canavan (49), Sean Kearney for E Hawe (55).

MacRory Cup Semi-Final 2018 – Maghera v Convent
St Mary's: O Lynch; C Doyle, G Lupari, L óg McElhone; J Crawford, S McErlain 1-0, J McCann; R Keenan, T Donaghy 1-0; D Bradley 1-3, 1-0 pen, 0-3 frees, T McAteer 0-2, 0-1 free, C Devlin; L Quinn 1-1, C Murphy 1-0, J McErlain.
Subs: D McAteer for D Bradley (46), A McCluskey for R Keenan (53), C O'Neill 0-1 for L Quinn

St Patrick's Maghera: N McNicholl, T McCusker, T Walsh, C McShane 0-1, D McNicholl, O McGill, P McLaughlin, O McWilliams, J McAtamney 0-1 free, E Mulholland, R Mullan, D McLaughlin, A Doherty 1-4, 1-0 pen, L McWilliams 0-7, 0-6 frees, T McHugh.
Subs: E Hawe for T McCusker (HT), E Doherty for T McHugh (38), PJ McAleese for E Mulholland (47)

Ulster Minor Club Final - 2018
St Colm's, Ballinascreen: R Scullion; D McCoy, C Doyle, R McKenna; R Doyle, A Bradley, Conal Logan; M Bradley (0-1), Christopher Logan; E McBride (0-1), C McAlinden, C Donnelly (0-2, 0-1 free); E Duggan, N Rafferty (0-2 frees), R McSorley.
Subs used: M Farrelly; D Kelly.

Ulster Minor Club Final - 2019
Bellaghy: D McErlean; R McFaul, C McLarnon, J Diamond; P McErlean, C Milne, O Lee; C McShane (3-0), K Friel(1-1); O McErlean (1-1), L Spier (0-5), L Brady; C Diamond (0-1 free), P Cassidy (1-2), R Lee (0-1 free).
Subs: O McClafferty for McLarnon (50), D Palframan for O Lee (55), S Turner for C Diamond (57), F Murray for Spier (60)

Ulster Minor Club Final - 2020
Lavey: J Scullion, Joe Duggan, S O'Neill, S Melaugh, N Duggan, R Farrell, R McGill, C Collins, Jamie Duggan (0-02), P McGuck (0-01), J McGurk (0-02), R McGill, C Downey (0-02), E Downey, M Downey (0-02f)

MacRory 2020
St Mary's Magherafelt: P McKinney; F Diamond, M McNeill, S McSorley; E McEvoy (0-1); C Mallon (0-1), J McErlain, A McCluskey (0-2); E Quinn, D Higgins (1-1); E McElhennon (0-1), R McKenna (0-4, frees), S Duffin; C Johnston (0-1), K McNicholl (0-1).
Subs: R McEldowney for E Quinn (47), C Ormsby (1-0) for S Duffin (55), C Crozier for K McNicholl (70), J McVey for R McKenna (72), C Fowley for C Mallon (79).

St Patrick's Maghera: Z Scullion, P McLaughlin, A McLaughlin, O McClafferty, S O'Neill, C Mullan, PJ McAleese, S McKearney, T Higgins, S Murray, E Doherty (0-2), C Diamond (0-1, 1F), S Kearney (0-4, 3F), M Dixon, C Higgins (2-2).
Subs: M Downey for Diamond, J McGurk for McAleese, S Cassidy for Dixon, L Downey for T Higgins, J McWilliams for Murray, C Chambers for C Higgins

2020 U20 Team v Fermanagh
Derry:
Ryan Scullion – Ballinascreen 2018
James Diamond – Bellaghy 2019
Tiarnán Walsh – St Patrick's Maghera 2018
Odhrán McLarnon - ?
Eunan Mulholland (0-2) - St Patrick's Maghera 2018
Iarlaith Donaghy – Derry Minor 2018
Aidan McCluskey – Derry Minor 2018 / St Mary's Magherafelt 2018/20
Kealan Friel (0-1) - Bellaghy 2019
Conleth McShane – St. Patrick's Maghera 2018 / Bellaghy 2019
Niall Doyle – Derry Minor 2018 / Ballinascreen 2018
Fintan Bradley - Lavey u21 Ulster Finalist 2018
Conleth McGuckin – Derry Minor 2018
Cormac Murphy – St Mary's Magherafelt 2018
Jude McAtamney – St Patrick's Maghera 2018
Tiarnán McHugh – St Patrick's Maghera 2018
SUBS:
Alex Doherty (0-5) – St Patrick's Maghera 2018
Oran Downey - Lavey u21 Ulster Finalist 2018
Noel Rafferty  - Ballinascreen 2018

Donnelly is not talking about 16 or 17 year olds.  He is talking about the 18 (almost 19) year old lads who won't play county football this year because of the fixture congestion. But you feel free to rant on my friend.

Excellent post. Great info.

[robbiegael]

U20 result
Antrim 1-9 Derry 2-4

[bannside]

I thought you scored a fourth point.