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[2 OG's]

In the first final last year after 33 minutes the score was Dublin 2-1, Mayo 0-4. The Dublin goals were the 2 OG's. I said it before the semi's and I will say it again, people have short memories, Mayo are the only team who can trouble the Dubs, they have proven it two years in succession. They have every chance of winning this one.

When are people going to stop this rubbish about Mayo conceding two "own goals" last year. There is no such thing as the concept of an "own goal" in Gaelic football. Dublin's two goals were brought about by incessant pressure from the Dublin forwards and still count as three points any day of the week.

Complete nonsense: Here's the video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-7QBhpUMgdc

The ball wouldn't have went in the net for either goal without the unfortunate touch of Mayo defenders.  On each occasion the Mayo defence had outnumbered the Dublin forwards.  For the first one, the ball was going wide before it was accidentally turned into the net.  For the second one, the great pressure provided by Dublin involved the forward dropping the ball just as he was about to be tackled. 

Yesterday, I felt that they showed Dublin too much respect.  There were various times where Dublin scored points with next to no space and a hungrier / tougher team would have been in there making blocks. I think Mayo would have made those blocks and punished Dublin for the wasted opportunities in the second half.  If Tyrone had played like psychos, as Enda McGinley had suggested, then it would have been a very different game and we would know more about where Tyrone are actually at. But they didn't, so it is still hard to know just how good these players are and whether they have the bottle to go and beat a team like Dublin.

No doubting that these Tyrone players are very good and their main strength is discipline in executing a game plan and not fouling.   However, I think the system of play might make the players look better than what they are as it allows them to pummel weaker opposition. Playing similar tactics as the opposition, I don't think they would have beaten Donegal, Armagh or Down by the same margins.  They still would have won, but it would have been much tighter.

So this system makes them look great against weaker teams but they are found out in a tight game or once they go behind.  Mentally, phsyically, skillswise, were they fit for the challenge of conceding a goal after 5 minutes yesterday? Only a few of them were while many went missing. 

Will this be a turning point for this Tyrone team.  Will they develop a plan B to go with their perfectly executed Plan A. Will they keep doing what they are doing and hope for improvements and tweaks to the game plan.  Will they get rid of Mickey and go backwards. Will they lose anyone else apart from Sean Cavanagh? 

All interesting questions, but as an Armagh man, I won't lose much sleep over them!!

no tyrone are miles ahead of the the teams they played this year .
tht is all they could do  but if you take the  view that ulster are now the weakest province for which there is a lot of evidence the yesterday was not quiet as suprising .
would tyrone have beaten kildare ,cork meath galway or even god help us Roscommon(esp the connact final drawn game version) I would have my doubts

Ulster football is not what it was, but to say that it's the weakest province when:
Armagh beat both Westmeath and Kildare (Leinster Semi-Finalist and Finalist)
Donegal beat Meath (Leinster Semi-Finalist)

Leinster with its population and strong football focus, should be the best, but is probably the worst nothwithstanting the fact that Dublin is the best team in Ireland. This stands up when you look at the percentage of teams in each province in each division of the league. 

Connaught is arguably the strongest with 2 from its five teams in the top division and Roscommon now in Division 2. It probably had the most competitive provincial championship this year, with greater potential for upsets.  Ulster and Munster on a par in terms of the percentage of their teams distributed across the top two divisions. Leinster is on balance the weakest province but has the strongest team in Ireland. 

Best comparison is on divisional status:
Ulster
Division 1 - 33%
Division 2 - 22%
Division 3 - 33%
Division 4 - 11%

Munster
Division 1 - 16%
Division 2 - 50%
Division 4 - 33%

Connaught
Division 1 - 40%
Division 2 - 20%
Division 3 - 20%
Division 4 - 20%

Leinster
Division 1 - 18%
Division 2 - 18%
Division 3 - 36%
Division 4 - 27%*
Incl Kilkenny

[It was supposed to be Universal healthcare]

At the risk of lighting a touchpaper, How was Obama care supposed to work? 

Did it mean that everyone was supposed to able to  buy health insurance?  I thought it was a form of NHS/HSE healthcare?  Was it?

It was supposed to be Universal healthcare, everyone was supposed to have it, Obama had noble intentions but they simply ram stammed it home and promises were made that you could keep your current GP/ Neurologists to push it trough, that was not the case and Obama lied to the people.

You got fined if you did not buy insurance and the younger you were the more of the burden you were going t carry over your lifetime, in other words the young carried the old under Obamacare.

If you were unemployed and at the lower end of the financial spectrum you got help and in fairness millions did benefit from it, the insurance companies started losing money and a lot of HMO's pull the plug in certain States. it is and was a monumental undertaking however the disastrous rollout for me encapsulated the Obama Presidency in a nutshell.

The companies that did not up stakes increased their premium year over year on average 53%, depending on who you listen to, sadly I see no end to the Obamacare debacle as the Republicans are just as inept and clueless and the Dems were ad that is bad news for the American people.

No it wasn't.

The fact that you are so angry at about something you clearly do not understand is the Republican voter mindset personified.

WTF are you on about? What am I angry about now ffs?

It wasn't meant to be universal health care. The ACA is actually a compromise bill, based on the Romneycare Massachusetts model. That Republican format was forced on Obama by the GOP initially, who were allowed and encouraged to participate in drawing up the bill. So after he had moved rightwards, after the Republicans had tabled hundreds of amendments that were considered during the committee stage, after they had blocked the government providing a public option for private insurance, which would have forced all insurance companies to price competitively or go out of business (of course the insurance companies spent millions lobbying the GOP to make sure that happened), the Republicans walked away from it and still didn't vote for it. Obama's big mistake was in not pushing the public option once it was clear that the GOP were engaging in sabotage rather than negotiation.

And then they push the line that it was "rammed" through, despite a full 10 months consideration, and complete adherence to parliamentary precedent. And people like you lap that up, throw out figures like 53% premium rises that you can't back up, and even if there was rises of that size, that is what the subsidies are there for. Of course, if there was a public option, those subsidies would not be needed in their present volume.

So you post online, in sadness and rage about a subject that, objectively, given that you think Obamacare was a failed attempt at universal healthcare, you don't even understand. You don't use unbiased sources, you don't do the maths, you don't consider the policy, and all you give us on this board is incoherent, primal screams about corrupt Dems - which has basically been the Republican manifesto since the American people had the temerity to put a black man in the Oval office.

Stew, I have no doubt that you met some Dems you thought were corrupt. That does not mean that all Dems are corrupt, or that Hillary was corrupt or that their policies are corrupt.

Republicans, on health care, tax reform, environmental issues - in fact everything that would matter to you, as a citizen (former, I know) in your daily life, long ago sacrificed compassion and the public good to crazed, discredited, trickledown, Darwinian, market worshipping ideology - which is nothing more than a beard to disguise the fact that donors pay Republicans to make sure those donors get more money.

I don't mind that you're angry that you're being screwed - but you don't even know who by. And that is sad.

The ever sadder part is that this is fairly symptomatic of US political life with voters taking entrenched positions and living in echo bubbles where all of their media is reinforcing these beliefs.  Support for political parties and ideologies is not based on thought out processes underpinned by advanced citizenship.  It is more akin to supporting a football team, where your team can do nothing wrong and the other team are a dirty, hateful shower of b***tids.   Not much different to the kind of politics we have in the six counties, only the ideology they are fighting over here is flags, parades and the past. People here are divided on stuff that doesn't matter in the greater scheme of things.  In America its healthcare, society and the economy.

The media (right wing in particular), commentators, politicians and interest groups there have done a fantastic job at segmenting people on the grounds of liberal versus conservative and people have been sucked into believing they are on the right side.  Anyone that allows themselves to be labelled, or uses these labels to define others is buying into this system and exacerbating divisiveness. I see it here daily from people on both sides of the political spectrum.

On the right wing in particular, there is a form of political brainwashing going on. This has been getting gradully worse over the last 20 years and I don't know how whole sections of society people will step back from these entrenched positions without some major event.  It is almost like some sort of jolt is required to pull people from this very skewed thinking which ignores logic and evidence in favour of agenda and ideaology. 

Stew, I have lurked on this board for years and have always found you to be a fascinating character.  I have wondered, how someone who has grown up in Armagh during the troubles and who must surely understand what it is like to be marginalised, can appear to support those who advocate policies that would be more at home with the Vanguard Unionists of the 1970s. 

And some of your Tyrone compatriots and maybe some of my own too!!!

There has been complaints regarding Armagh supporters in every game in the backdoor this year
Against Westmeath / Tipp and now Tyrone. Seems to be a sc**bag element / buck fast Brigade

As a Armagh follower, I don't have any problem addressing the fact that we have some supporters that jump on the bandwagon, get hammered and behave like prats.  If I see a crowd behaving in the same way in Tyrone, Down or Dublin jerseys, I don't immediately associate that behaviour with the county, the county board, the county team, all their supporters. 

However, there are plenty on here, predisposed to dislike Armagh, Tyrone, Dublin, Northerners, Freestaters or whoever.  When they see the hooligans in jerseys that they are pre-disposed to dislike, their negative perceptions about the county are reinforced.  It's a bit like the way in Belfast on St. Patrick's Day you get unionist politicians lining up to criticise the rowdiness in the Holylands and after the 12th they are nowhere to be seen - and vice versa. 

There are plenty of football bigots that see bad behaviour in other teams' followers and never see it in their own, and people could do with growing up a bit. 

[(some as far back as 17 years ago!)]

There is really very little that either county board can do about this incident, however I do think they should issue a statement condemning it.
Reading fans of other counties talk about incidents involving Armagh & Tyrone fans over the years (some as far back as 17 years ago!) is really quite ridiculous...I could recount many incidents over the years where I have seen fans of other counties acting the drunken maggot including Derry lads at the first round of the Championship last year against Tyrone where a group of lads who had clearly been out on the lash from the night before proceeded to call just about every Tyrone player all the c**nts of the day (they were completely stinking too). Thankfully they left before the first half ended. Could talk about similar incidents with Cavan, Down, Fermanagh, Meath, Laois and Dublin fans. Maybe it is more prominent with Armagh & Tyrone because they bring a significantly larger support than most other counties (obviously barring Dublin). It would be great if these lads stayed away (like they do until we have a game in Croke Park) but unfortunately I can't see anything changing
The big problem is that in this country just about every big event is turned into a complete piss up. The footage from the train could have been taken in any town across the country on a Saturday night I have no doubt.

That long - was football even invented then?

Anyone remember an incident in Clones - Qualifier match - possibly 2001 / 2002 - Derry v Dublin.  Drunk Dublin fan decides to streak across the pitch, gets as far as the bottom of the hill and then goes onto relieve himself up against the fence. Think he got a couple of skelps for his trouble! 

I was in Croke Park for the Kildare match and having parked, a bus load of 18-22 year olds landed and the proceeded to act the maggot along Drumcondra Road.  They were hammered for a start, pushing/shoving each other, bumping into other pedestrians and slabbering for all they were worth.  It is great to see and hear big support for the county, but there is nothing more embarrassing to see fellow supporters carrying on like that, all neatly identifiable as Armagh and GAA supporters. 

However, if you think this is an Armagh or Tyrone problem you're deluded.  Every county has their share of assholes following them and some of them can't even use drink as an excuse for their boorish behaviour.  The notion that going to the match includes 6/7 pints in a bar before hand or a carryout on the way down the road.  I hesitate to ask, but you can honestly tell me that Cavan doesn't have a problem with laddish behaviour and that these lads wouldn't be in Croke Park the next time Cavan put a run together. 

But it was always cyclical before, so you can understand why people think it will continue to be.  Then you have those that have a vested interest in not acknowledging that things have changed with the advent of paid full time coaches and players not working for a living. 
Amateurism used to mean, working 5/6 days a week, training 3 nights a week and a match on a Sunday.  Maybe a week or two off work in the run up to an All Ireland final. 
Then for some it meant staying in third level education and delaying the start of your career for as long as possible, so you could devote more time to training. 
Then for some it meant getting a full time coaching job with the county board to encourage you to stay in the country and make it easier to train and play at a high level. 
Now for some it means not working at all and living the life of a professional athlete. 

Looks like a direction of travel to me and in this environment, the counties with the money will use it to facilitate this approach.  Not mind you, in the interest of the player, who would be much better off embracing the amateur ethos and ensuring that they have some kind of a career for themselves when its all over. 

Reilly? Really??

Dublin got to 6 finals in a row in the 70s, winning 3 of them. This team will pass. It's like Kerry in the 00s. They were on the brink of 3 in a row and nobody blinked.

It'll all be grand.

'This team'?

Look at Dublin 2011 and Dublin 2017. A lot of change. This is not a special team - this is a conveyor belt of talent being churned out.

There will be very few watching football in 5 years time.

In an amateur world, the conveyor belt stops because so much effort is required by volunteers to keep the talent coming through.  The problem as I see it is that the counties on a stronger financial footing are able to pay for full time coaches, which removes this barrier to continued success.  This isn't just a Dublin issue.  The successful counties are very well funded and in this regard, success breeds success.  The more exposure and success, the more sponsorship and enthusiasm from supporters clubs etc. 

Its getting harder and harder for counties to break into that elite group. To do it and maintain it, counties probably need to focus on one code, have a large player / club base, long term plan and continuous high level of funding at a structural level.  Teams like Donegal, Armagh can make a short burst at it with a talented group of players, innovative tactics and intense training.  But this will not be maintained unless there is a long term plan in place at a structural level with financial backing for coaching in schools and clubs. 

There are reports from the GAA on the cost of preparing county teams annually.  Do we have reports on what is spent on coaching in clubs and schools.  That would tell us a lot more about the true position of counties as spending a fortune on county teams is just papering over the cracks if the foundations aren't in place. 

I have to laugh at the nonsense about splitting the championship into tiers.  We have four teams a mile ahead of the rest.  On their day, some of the rest will give them a game if they are at the top of their game and the top teams under perform.  Outside that it is competitive among the remainder.  The other division 1 teams (2017/18), Monaghan, Donegal, Cavan, Galway and Kildare were all beaten by Division 2 / 3 opposition in the Championship this year. 

If you were trying to tier the Championship on this years form, you would segment the top four from Division 1.  Another segment from the bottom half of Division 1, all of Division 2 and the top three teams in Division 3.  The remainder of Division 3 and 4 would be in a third tier (although that would be tough on Carlow). Obviously you would have to make an exception for Longford given their uncanny ability to perform in the qualifiers. 

The nonsense is that if you were to segment on the basis of performance, the top tier would start at Semi-Finals.

Good thread - I would have thought that Cavan was the obvious one!! Has there ever been a Cavan team without a Brady on it?

And the Tyrone supporter who is reported to have punched a young Armagh girl in the face was any better?  This isn't just an Armagh problem, and its not just a GAA problem.  It is a societal problem. Spoke to middle-aged Tyrone friends at the game on Saturday and they said that they wouldn't take the train after the rowdiness of a crowd from Coalisland last year.  These prats let the GAA down a bagful and sections of the media gleefully report it. 

Nothing ventured, nothing gained and beats the hell out of selling tickets to win a car if you ask me.  If it works and they get even half what they are targeting, every county will be at it. I'd like to think that they have a good online campaign organised.

Tyrone are very sophisticated in their fundraising now, but I remember in 1986, they knocked plenty of doors in Co. Armagh fundraising for the expense of training the team for the All-Ireland final.