Messages

Am I missing something here. First he was biased against lambs and did them injustice in U21 semi and now we are told he was on their side in the match against cargin ? Seriously lads listen to yourselves.   No doubt he has made mistakes as has every referee apart from MR. But they are human and the same way we don't like to see players being blamed for losing matches cos they missed easy chances we find it oh so easy to blame a referee .  I think if you were ask actual players who play they rarely blame a referee , well certainly not solely blame them . It's mainly supporters ho have the issues and again because its easier to blame a referee than point the fingers at the inabilities of their own club players.

Think you are indeed missing quite a lot  mbaa, the ref in question is without doubt a poor referee or he is unashamedly biased when he officiates at Cargin games..........one or the other...........and if indeed he is considering retirement then nobody in Toome will shed a single tear

But why would he be? Is it just at Cargin games? Which referees would you prefer? one with same initials maybe?

Jaysus Lads

If I wasnt depressed enough lately with the state of our games in Antrim and further afield reading through the last number of pages makes me feel even worse.

Take a step back for one minute from you own vested interests and have a look at the childish petty points that are being made about different clubs and refs on here. This club doesnt like this one, this ref is biased against the other. Hold on a second lads is this the type of county we want to be, is this how the future is going to be? Are we ever going to step up, put our heads above the parapet and say enough is enough.

Instead of wasting on time on these squabbles we should be trying to develop our clubs and our county driving them forward and increasing the standard in general. Everyone take personal responsibility for their own behaviour, then once you have done that take responsibility for the behaviour of the young people in your charge. Instil the proper beliefs in them, show them how to play the games like young men with skill and bravery to the best of their ability. If they win, win with grace, if they lose lose with grace. Dont forget these young people only react to the behaviour of the adults that they see and are around, so if the adults act like fools what do we expect?

Fed up of this point scoring between clubs while we get further and further behind the standard of football all around us and hurling further south. IMO the standard of club hurling and football has dropped significantly and to me that is a bigger challenge to us Antrim people. This continuous cycle of recrimination after every single competition only serves to hold us back from what should be a common goal.

Sorry Rant Over!

NAG1 I agree, yourself included have had a wee dig at certain clubs and vice versa. Some people on here have agenda with certain referees and have opened up accounts for this purpose. I'm just quering the logic of some of the posters in their posts regarding a clubman and a fellow referee, similar to how you'd react if attention thrown at your club.

Very few positive posts lately

Yeah I know I have and it is easy to react when it is close to home, my point is that we are all inclined to the negative and this last few pages have shown this quite clearly. But this is not how I want the organisation to go forward and in fact if we persist with this type of behaviour we will turn our kids off from coming into and staying in our clubs and wanting to play for our county teams.

Fed up of the negativity really I guess

Ok 100% agree, will bite my tonuge   and put up some positive stuff, looking forward to hurling with the reserves (kids) next year would like another few games before I hang up the boots from playing

Aye right lads we can go forward in positivity but can any of you who have insight into the affairs of the Saffron please explain why no country/south west club other than Cargin have won the senior football championship in over half a century.................

Country teams havent performed on the big day. I played in the 80s/90s when Cargin were again the stand out sw team. They had many chances to win the SC but lacked the craft and discipline to get past average Rossa and St Pauls sides. Glenravel werent far away at this time either and always performed well at championship time but just hadnt enough quality all over the pitch to really count. Dunloy always hard to beat in the championship and i firmly believe  if they had concentrated on football rather than hurling they could have won a few championships around this time. We were sunflowers come championship time and usually only enjoyed one day a year in Senior competition, just weren't good enough.
   

Can't remember a worse championship performance by an Antrim team, even going back to the wide fest against the same opposition in '89. Baffling how 8mins into the second half the tactics werent changed and some of the substitutions were baffling. MJ at midfield was still in Creggan as he definately didnt turn up at Casement, our lack of support runners from half back was amazing, considering we had 6 half backs! The thing that summed it all up was Ck coming up to hit that free, what a load of balls! FD ( and i have been a supporter of giving him a chance) must have watched how Cavan played against Armagh and just copied their play book, the only problem was that MOR is not JG and he he simply left his half back line in place which completely negated our ball into space for the two men left up front. On the day tactics go wrong, fair enough, but what is unacceptable at this level is that when its not working that its not changed!
I feel extremely sorry for those Antrim players who have trained and given up their time and sacraficed so much to go out and play in a system which was best naive and at worst a complete shambles.
Qualifiers dont hold much hope for me and any team in Ireland ( or England) will be looking at us as a prime draw. 

FD cant be blamed for everything! Two midfielders who couldn't time a jump against Meath, shocking finishing against Sligo, half backs who push up the field looking for scores and cant be bothered to get back! Players carry a lot of the responsibility for the last few games. Loughrey, Sweeny and Micks absence really has shown up alot of our other players as even more mediocre than already thought. Always found FD to be a very approachable and level headed guy so really cant understand what has happened with the TS and Tomas affair, there must be more to that story than the Irish Snooze related.
There is no magic wand that is going to turn this team around. Antrim produced very little in the way of quality players in the last 6/7 years and by the displays of our U21 and minor teams recently that is not going to change, but to knee jerk and dismiss a manager of Fd experience a few months into his tenure would be madness. 

 JC from Cargin, current half back. Bit of a dig on him during them game and it lead to a confrontation after the match that ended badly for the Glenullin player.

Jc put some manners into the glenullin man after the game. Gok spouting at him and jc put him down.

Bit of afters in Celtic Park the other night. GOK has a very sore jaw!

A free crack. My opinion doesn't agree with yours son its a cheap shot? . I don't rate him as a footballer from what I have seen him playing the past few years. Apologies to all for stating my opinion.

Can't see anything wrong with MAB stating his opinion and i wouldn't call it a cheap shot as he wasn't insulting or defamatory towards Micko just said his opinion. I don't agree with MAB's opinion of Micko, but have to say he has underachieved since showing great promise as an underage player.   
Ulster League fixtures out today, not many Antrim clubs took up the invite. We have a bit of a trek away in the first game to Malin, not looking forward to that, but i will be delighted to see senior football back at Dreen this year.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iablOpueDLk

County Antrim Post has a short video of the Derry game on Fbook. Who was the eejit who tried to volley the ball into the Derry net and fell on his backside?

Antrim Team v Tyrone 13th Jan 2013

1   Chris Kerr   Naomh Gall
2   Kevin O Boyle Clann na hEireann
3   Paul Doherty   Ros Earcain
4   Sean Finch   Ui Dhonnabhain Rosa
5   Tony Scullion   Clann na hEireann
6   Dermott Mc Cann   Ciceam Creagan
7   Justin Crozier    Clann na hEireann
8   Sean Mc Veigh   Naomh Uile
9   John Carron   Clann na hEireann
10   Conor Murray   Lamh Dhearg
11   Kevin Niblock Naomh Gall
12   Colm Fleming   Ui Dhonnabhain Rosa
13   Michael Mc Cann   Clann na hEireann
14   Michael Herron Lamh Dhearg
15   Michael Pollock   Naomh Gall
16   Benny Marron   Naomh Eargnaid
17   Nial Delargy   Mhic Asmaint
18   James Lavery   Clann na hEireann
19   Conal Kelly   Naomh Eoin
20   Brendan Herron   Lamh Dhearg
21   Dermott Mc Aleese   Mhic Asmaint
22   Paddy Cunningham   Lamh Dhearg
23   Kieran Close   Clann na hEireann
24   Ryan Murray   Lamh Dhearg
25   Peter Mc Nicholl   Naomh Uile
26   Paddy Kelly Mhic Asmaint
27   Fergal Johnson   Clann na hEireann

cant remember his name, he was with with Irish Cricket team.

Talking with a few lads on the County Senior panel, all very positive about new management, training going very well and the new S&C coach is a bit hit.

Gregory O'Kane confirmed as new Manager of Rasharkin Senior Hurling Team.

Heard that the U-14 development squads are doing strength and conditioning/weights, at that age? What sort of muppets are in charge of these squads?

The S&C element is only starting this week with this group and is a vital part of player development. You only have to look at the the Antrim U21 game v Clare to see the difference in physicality between a county who have only played lip service to development squads s&c and one who has been at the forefront of this for 6/7 years. 
The key at this age group is to develop good technique over quantity. The aim is to introduce functional strength training, show the benefits, give proper instruction and concentrate on form.
Every club side has now jumped on the s&c band wagon but all too often technique is sacraficed to grunting and pace, were with proper instruction more could be achieved in less than half the time.
I have been impressed with the U14 development squad coaches so far this year, much more so than some of the other age groups. 

Nobody upset on here, certainly not myself or MR2. In fact I think we didsmissed it and would take a lot more than a tweet to upset us. The majority of our club like to do our talking on the pitch and even the players you hinted at in your post have done plenty of talking on the pitch against the lambs. So we will leave it at that until we meet again in the championship and maybe save the lambs supporters a few quid again

Very generous offer in these hard times.