Messages

Congratulations to Rangers -another great achievement, despite the fact that the team continues to change from the start of this run (1996). Well done to all concerned! 

Congratulations to two fellow Harps men who were in receipt of awards at the County Dinner last night in the Carrickdale Hotel.

Our esteemed President, Sean Hart Senior, received a Lifetime Achievement award in honour of many years of service to both Club and County and Declan Coulter was named County Senior Hurler of the year. Declan plays his hurling with Armagh Cuchulainns and represented not only Cuchulianns and Armagh, but also Ulster in the Railway Cup and Ireland (against Scotland) in the hurling/shinty. Congratulations to both on these well deserved accolades.

Thats Why Tir na nOg have never won anything in their lives, to many boys telling you how to play when they couldn't do it on the field. . And the last team in Armagh who should have beaten Cross was indeed the Ogs in keady, i was at the game and Bendover is correct

Ditto, the Ogs were very unlucky that day, thank God!!! 

Disagree Sureyouwill - luck did not come into it and neither in my opinion did the Oisin McConville incident. The real reason the Ogs didn't win is that they didn't believe in themselves - end of! They beat themselves.

[Presentation Night - Saturday 9th December in the ClubRace Day - Fairyhouse - Saturday 10th March]

By the way, thanks to Randal for phoning me on the mobile when I was making my report to the meeting! 

Classic!

I know Orior - is nothing sacred? 

Don't forget two important dates coming up;

Presentation Night - Saturday 9th December in the Club

Race Day - Fairyhouse - Saturday 10th March

Book your place at the bar early for the presentation night as Pup Clarke says he will have some great stories from the eighties to regale us with! 

Conor Moore is taking money now for the Day at the Races - anyone who has paid 25 pounds by the end of this month will be entered into a free draw - a similar draw will take place at the end of December for those with 50 pounds paid and so on up to February and 100 pounds submitted.

AGM held in the Club tonight. Crowd was about par for the course over recent years; 45-50. Good though to see a few new younger faces at what would be (I would guess) their first AGM.

James Clifford as Chair kept a tight rein on the schedule and it was over by 10.20pm. 

Most officers returned unopposed and good to see several new faces on the Committee.

For the record;

Chairman - James Clifford,
Vice Chairman - John Rath
Acting Secretary - Colm O'Hare
Assistant Secretary - Colm O'Hare
Treasurer - Kieran Grimley
Assistant Treasurer - Conor Moore
Youth Officer - Paul McKenna
Registrar - Art McGinn

Committee; Pearse Dynes, Paul Rath, Eugen Fagan, Phil McGinn, Simon Clarke, Malachy Geraghty, Mick McKenna, Paula Powell, Leo Duffy, Gerry Cauldwell, Martin McKenna, Martin Gill and Brenda Gill.

By the way, thanks to Randal for phoning me on the mobile when I was making my report to the meeting! 

By the way - I don't get out too often - just heard, congratulations to Say Nothin and the wife after their recent addition. Welcome to my world kid!  Hope everyone is keeping well! 

It was commented on here at the time, certainly by Hardy if my memory serves me well, that the ref effectively killed the Francie v Donaghey contest with his use of the yellow early on and the immortal line "once more and you're off!" It was after this that Donaghey did the damage.

If applying the rules and leveling the playing field "Killed the contest" then perhaps Armagh had no business showing up. To paraphrase Kieran McGeeney "if it's pulling and dragging they want then we'll pull and drag !" 

Mike, don't take the quote out of context - I would have thought that you'd more in you than that.

I've no problem believing that the ref can justify his actions that day via the rule book. My issue is with double standards, i.e. one for Francie and another for the rest. As an example of this, I watched the current All Star full back pull, drag, haul and wrestle Ronan Clarke over two games - and the ball was fifty yards away!!

By all means book players for pulling - but let's do it to more than just those that the press/fans/opposition give a bad reputation to!   

Still think we would have won the 2003 final if he hadn't been wrongly sent off.

Such a crowd of whingers.

Rufus, can you shed any light on the U-21 fixture with the Nab.

Just waiting on the county board?

I would assume Spirit that it might have to take a back seat until the Nab are out of the Ulster Club - and that might come quicker than expected if the noises emanating from Danny Murphy are anything to go by! 

It was commented on here at the time, certainly by Hardy if my memory serves me well, that the ref effectively killed the Francie v Donaghey contest with his use of the yellow early on and the immortal line "once more and you're off!" It was after this that Donaghey did the damage.

At the risk of coming across a little bit high and mighty which is not the attention, I would suggest Francie killed the contest by fouling him so many times and forcing the Ref into doing this. It's not like his card was unwarranted, he had been blatantly hanging out of Donaghy all day. Blaming the Ref is a little bit disingenuous to my mind.

I will say this - it was harsh on Francie that of the nominated full backs, he was the only one that actually had to mark Donaghy this year, the other two were untested in that regard and it's fair to say that they mightn't have done any better. Francie failed a test that neither owens nor Canty sat, as it were.

No, that's fair enough Lone Shark - what I would say is that I watched Owens do something similar to Ronan Clarke over 140 minutes plus and he was never in any danger of leaving the pitch. I just get the impression with Francie it's a case of 'give a dog a bad name'.   

Just a reminder to Harps punters here that the Annual Mass in memory of deceased members is in St Malachys tonight at 7.30pm.

Wasnt Owens fecked outta the way like a little boy by Clarke in the ulster Championship

Not sure, I didn't see it. Everyone saw what Donaghy did to Bellew. To suggest Bellew should have got the Allstar is a joke and an example of the kind of shit that loses us good contributers on this board.

New Board; same old same old. Francie did not really deserve one, but to claim otherwise is not the fantasy that you suggest.

It was far from a vintage year as regards full backs and it could have gone to others. Francie was shortlisted, so him getting it would not have been inconceivable as Owens didn't particularly stand out.

It was commented on here at the time, certainly by Hardy if my memory serves me well, that the ref effectively killed the Francie v Donaghey contest with his use of the yellow early on and the immortal line "once more and you're off!" It was after this that Donaghey did the damage.

Edit - forgot to add - congratulations to Ronan Clarke - well deserved! 

Voted for Geezer with Paul McGrane I would suggest closest. Oisin was immense up to 2003 whilst Stevie has been immense since 2002.  To my mind, they are the only four that could be considered for such an accolade.

Two words cost us the match. Louis Saha! For f**ks sake how the f**k did they lose to Celtic?

Since we have lost Stew and none of the Harps crew have leapt in, it is up to me as his schoolmate at Greenpark CBS to nominated Jonny Corvan as the most naturally talented in Armagh.  Unfortunately, his talent was largely badly managed and lost. Even the College boys would agree with Corvan's nomination as the most naturally talented Armagh player.

I have nothing further to add!

On second thoughts I have - if we are talking natural talent only, then Corvan has no peer in Ulster! Simple as that!   

Refereeing mistake:

2003 All Ireland semi final - the referee's inexplicable failure to send off John McEntee for his forearm smash on Barry Monaghan with less than ten minutes to go, the game on a knife edge and the ref standing a couple of feet away. McEntee contributed to Armagh's two injury-time scores that won the game. In the same match, Ray Sweeney was sent off early in the second half, while Kieran McGeeney stayed on despite persistant fouling.

Don't worry J70 - the persistant fouling was well highlighted in the post match analysis, to the extent that at the handshake in Armagh's next match, the first words by Brian to Geezer were, "You watch the fouling'. It seemed to play on Brian's mind in the first half of that game! 

You have me at a bit of a loss here: I don't remember the details of Brian McGuigan's performance against McGeeney in the final!

Or are we talking about some other "Brian"?  Did Brian White ref the final?

Never thought of Brian McGuigan - you're correct - I'm referring to Brain White!