Tyrone v Kerry All Ireland Final 2008

[Fear ón Srath Bán]

I meant the final itself, not the whole series of games. Omisson on my part.

[ziggysego]

Where's the big love in? Is the meet up in danger of not happening before the game now?

[filthylittlebeast]

Latest news:

Paul Galvin will start on the bench on Sunday after serving his three-month suspension, while Tyrone will keep Stephen O'Neill, who came out of retirement last week, in reserve as well. (The Star)

Tyrone's record in this decade against Kerry is undoubtedly the source of any confidence they harbour ahead of the final.

In nine meetings, two championship and seven in League, Tyrone have lost just twice (both League) and drawn one.

Significantly for Kerry one of their victories and the draw have come post All-Ireland final 2005, a game which they lost by 1-16 to 2-10 . This could be a good omen for Sunday.
Of the '05 All-Ireland final O'Connor recalls: "Losing to Tyrone is worse than losing to almost anyone else. Not that there's much history between us. That's the point. There's an arrogance to Northern football that rubs people up the wrong way. They're flash and nouveau riche and full of it."

Later on O'Connor admits to trawling through the Ulster GAA website for information on tackling drills and meeting up with a well-known Ulster GAA figure in Dublin to prise information about how Tyrone et al go about their business.

Thats a bit unfair of O'Connor trying to get inside infomation on how Tyrone play!!

[Rois]

You know, the build up to this AI could not be going better for us. In 2005 maybe we were going into the game with certain assumptions e.g it was going to be like 2003 etc but this year all the assumptions are coming from Tyrone...I have lost count of the number of times that some Tyrone poster has said that Kerry are "worried" about Tyrone or that Tom O'Sullivan is "worried" about Stephen O'Neill....Tyrone are placing an awful lot of emphasis, indeed seem to be banking on, Kerry being "worried" about Tyrone. There seems to be an internal script playing through the heads of Tyrone people e.g Stephen O'Neill will come on, score 1-3...Kerry will crumble etc, etc" that you wonder what is going to happen if things dont start going to plan. The last time  team that went into a game with such strong assumptions about the opposition or the way a game was "supposed" to go was the Dublin team a few weeks back and, before that, probably us in 2005.

OK Mike, I've read this a few times and still trying to get to grips with the point you're trying to make, and getting very bored while doing so, "internal scrips", constant repetition of the work "assumptions" etc.  
Tyrone people are assuming that things will go our way?  Are you mad?  We're absolutely hopping with joy to be in the final when back in June we weren't "assuming" we'd be anywhere near.
Kerry worried about Stephen O'Neill?  I'm sure they are, cause most of Tyrone is worried about what impact Stephen O'Neill will have, so nothing new in that.

As with the last couple of games, Tyrone will play their own game, not what they think Kerry will or won't be expecting.  Given the strength of the Kerry team, Mickey will have to play to our strengths, rather than Kerry's weaknesses (as there aren't many).
You'll forgive us for being excited, not having had many AIFs to attend but all this psycho-crap about expectations is exactly that.  We're just crazily hyped up, and as in many cases, the chase is more enjoyable than the catch, so I'm embracing the run up to this match wholeheartedly.  

[Hank Everlast]

Anyone shed any light on where Dooher has been, he hasnt been training lately or even seen in a while now??

[give her dixie]

Maybe he away growing a beard?

[Fear ón Srath Bán]

Seán Moran, in today's Irish Times, and where the only word missing from Micko's tirade against Down is 'puke' 

History not on Kerry's side this time around

Tyrone are the last team the champions would have wanted to face at this juncture, writes Seán Moran

IN THE rush to memorialise Kilkenny's achievement in winning a third successive All-Ireland, it's easy to lose sight of the fact that Kerry are one match away from doing the same thing.

There are reasons for this. Kilkenny have broken new ground by going to the top of the roll of honour for the first time and hadn't previously won three in a row on the field of play. Kerry, on the other hand, have led football's role of honour since 1941 and won four three-in-a-row sequences.

The hurling champions are a great deal farther in front of the current field than their football counterparts and there is an acceptance that those governing circumstances won't be changing any time soon. It could be argued that for all the unease triggered by Kilkenny's absolute dominion in the MacCarthy Cup, Kerry have been leaving similarly little to chance in recent years. The county's last three All-Ireland wins have been by virtually the same cumulative margin as Kilkenny's (31 as against 33).

That would be misleading because Kerry's one-sided track record in finals obscures the essential competitiveness of the football championship. Whereas Kilkenny have never had much use for the qualifier route - none of their six All-Irelands this decade were sullied by a single defeat along the way - Kerry have been grateful for its indulgence in 2006 and not least, this year.

In fact this year's football final marks a historic juncture in the All-Ireland championships, being the first to be contested between two previously defeated teams.

This competitiveness is what maintains the football championship as the best-attended sports competition in the country. There may be poor-quality matches and questionable levels of sportsmanship but there is also a great sense of the possible about the championship that allows counties to emerge from virtually nowhere and get a run maybe all the way to Croke Park.

Few aspects of football history are as competitive as that between Kerry and Ulster. The province has a reverence for Kerry football that never stoops to obsequiousness. In the days when Mick O'Dwyer's teams ruled football, they could be guaranteed a good rattle when going north for league matches - from teams that could hardly lay a finger on them during the summer.

But the championship record between Kerry and Ulster teams is surprisingly balanced. To a far greater degree than teams from the other two provinces, northern counties have a very robust record. In fact, Ulster is the only province to be able to boast a trade surplus in All-Ireland finals with Kerry.

Unsurprisingly this has led to friction. By virtue of their historically less frequent victories and the range of winners (for example five in the last 15 years), counties from the north have tended to ascribe innovative properties to their successes, whether in terms of technical advances in training or other idiosyncratic methods of preparation.

Former Down captain Joe Lennon, a founding father in the field of modern Irish physical education and author of several coaching manuals, famously declared Kerry football 30 years behind the times.

O'Dwyer, whose playing career was blighted by Down's pioneering successes in the 1960s had a recriminatory view of the Ulster county's emergence, which was bluntly stated in the mid-1970s: "I think Down did a lot of damage to Gaelic football. They broke the ball a lot and they played it very close and marked tightly. They weren't playing the ball that much but they played the man quite a lot. I suppose it paid dividends for them. They fouled men in the centre of the field - and won All-Irelands with it. But it was not a good thing for the game."

By the time of his autobiography Blessed and Obsessed (with Martin Breheny, 2007), O'Dwyer's views hadn't changed greatly.

"On the minus side they introduced a degree of negativity, which must have been pre-planned. They had no qualms whatsoever about fouling a player well out the field.

"The free had to be taken from the ground back then giving them time to regroup, which they did most effectively. I would be the first to pay tribute to Down for the many positive and creative aspects they used such as off-the-ball running, support play, accurate passing and ball retention but there's no doubt they also exploited as much negativity as they thought they could get away with. There were no 'ticks' or yellow cards, which meant that provided the challenge wasn't of the seriously 'dirty' variety, a player could foul as much as he liked without any consequences other than giving away a free.

"Down used that to good effect so it was very difficult to build up any momentum against . . . I know they have always denied that deliberate fouling was part of their plan but I played against them often enough to suspect that it most definitely was."

Ulster teams have thwarted Kerry at significant moments in football history. It was Cavan who put a stop to Kerry's first five-in-a-row attempt by defeating them in the 1933 All-Ireland semi-final. Fourteen years later the same counties contested the historic Polo Grounds final and again Cavan were the winners. Arguably Tyrone's defeat of Kerry three years ago derailed what could have been another three-in-a-row.

That defeat together with the '03 semi-final blitz and Armagh's All-Ireland win a year previously have meant this decade has been another when northern football has forced the agenda. If the 2003 meeting was a bolt from the blue it was also a learning experience and two years later Kerry were fully confident they had absorbed the necessary lessons and so the failure to match Tyrone's speed of thought and movement was almost more demoralising.

In Kerry there is acknowledgment that, because of this recent history, Tyrone are about the last opponents the champions would have wanted to see waiting at the end of the road. It is a chance for Kerry to balance the books with Tyrone but with that opportunity comes the nagging anxiety that this is a test where history isn't on their side.

[D4S]

Just got guaranteed a ticket happy days, I can't wait!!!  Honestly wish everyone else good luck tryin to get theirs great sense of relief when you're told definite yes...i'll have a pint when I get it in my hand!

[Main Street]

Former Down captain Joe Lennon, a founding father in the field of modern Irish physical education and author of several coaching manuals, famously declared Kerry football 30 years behind the times.

I remember at a Down game possibly against Kerry, a Kerry family member loudly quipping after Joe pulled off a dubious stroke "I didn't read about that one in the book Joe".
I detected some "resentment" about the nerve of an upstart, a non Kerryman writing a Gaelic coaching manual.

[ziggysego]

Got my ticket

[T Fearon]

http://www.gaa.ulsterbank.com/news.html/3474

Peter The Rebel has spoken

[A Quinn Martin Production]

Seán Moran, in today's Irish Times, and where the only word missing from Micko's tirade against Down is 'puke' 

History not on Kerry's side this time around


O'Dwyer, whose playing career was blighted by Down's pioneering successes in the 1960s had a recriminatory view of the Ulster county's emergence, which was bluntly stated in the mid-1970s: "I think Down did a lot of damage to Gaelic football. They broke the ball a lot and they played it very close and marked tightly. They weren't playing the ball that much but they played the man quite a lot. I suppose it paid dividends for them. They fouled men in the centre of the field - and won All-Irelands with it. But it was not a good thing for the game."

By the time of his autobiography Blessed and Obsessed (with Martin Breheny, 2007), O'Dwyer's views hadn't changed greatly.

"On the minus side they introduced a degree of negativity, which must have been pre-planned. They had no qualms whatsoever about fouling a player well out the field.

"The free had to be taken from the ground back then giving them time to regroup, which they did most effectively. I would be the first to pay tribute to Down for the many positive and creative aspects they used such as off-the-ball running, support play, accurate passing and ball retention but there's no doubt they also exploited as much negativity as they thought they could get away with. There were no 'ticks' or yellow cards, which meant that provided the challenge wasn't of the seriously 'dirty' variety, a player could foul as much as he liked without any consequences other than giving away a free.

"Down used that to good effect so it was very difficult to build up any momentum against . . . I know they have always denied that deliberate fouling was part of their plan but I played against them often enough to suspect that it most definitely was."

Micko should read up on reports of the 1946 semi final to see which county was the first to use deliberate fouling as a tactic.

[Puckoon]

Canavan? Canavan? Sure what the feck would he know about anything!?

[Bensars]

"It's a massive gamble from the point of view of bringing someone in so late and disrupting the team dynamic and the morale that existed before Stephen came back, " said Canavan. "The boys will tell you that the subs were training every bit as hard as anyone and there was a great team ethic. We're hoping this hasn't been affected. "There's a chance that when you take in anybody at such a late stage, before an occasion like that, that you are going to affect harmony, no matter how welcome they are. "That's the gamble and if Tyrone lose then that's what people are going to say cost them. Mickey took a huge gamble in a final before and it worked for him so we'll take it that he's made the right call, " he added.

Its exactly the same as most journalists and analysts have been saying since it happened.

Nice try fat boy, but no story here im afraid !

[Rois]

What language were you thinking in when you named this thread Tony?