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Once the men in suits get their way the main competition will likely have to be called the Sam Maguire cup. Can't call it the All Ireland when all of Ireland isn't taking part.

That's like saying it shouldn't have been called that when New York & London were competiting.

[Fancy United/Liverpool to dethrone City.]

Anybody any bold predictions? I think Leeds will suffer a strong case of second season syndrome and be fighting for survival. I also believe Aston Villa will push into the top 7 or so and will be pushing for Europa League football. Fancy United/Liverpool to dethrone City.

And if Kane and Grealish are signed by Pep?

Seen a few videos doing the rounds on whatsapp of Jack Grealish off his head on drugs with which looked like coke on his nose. I hope he can nip this craic in the bud as he has high expectations next season

I do think the winners will have to hit the mid-90s in terms of points.

Couldn't see Pep signing both but possibly one of them. You are correct there is no doubt both of them are serious losses to their clubs and serious gains for City. However, I can't see Kane moving away this year but Grealish probably will. I thought Villa were formidable enough last year in his absence. Early days yet but.

Supposedly Pep wants them both, if Villa and Spurs agree to sell.

But who knows what will end up happening?

https://theathletic.com/2706821/2021/07/15/manchester-city-transfers-champions-determined-to-sign-both-kane-and-grealish/

That article covers every single base possible. It's quite clear the author hasn't a notion what is going on. But I guess saying that won't sell subscriptions. City can want them all they want but they have 3 (Kane) and 4 (Grealish) years left on their contracts. Levy never lets his players go easy, and Villa('s owners) are so wealthy that they simply don't need the cash.

i happen to think hes bang on the money , i dont understand this complete disgust when some offer an alternative to the commonly held narrative . injuries are also starting to hurt the dubs. look they are still favs but touching even money from 8/13 a couple of months ago. If we beat galway id give our bucks a  good chance of actually winning the all ireland. kerry do not frighten me from a mayo perspective .

Delusional comment.

[Fancy United/Liverpool to dethrone City.]

Anybody any bold predictions? I think Leeds will suffer a strong case of second season syndrome and be fighting for survival. I also believe Aston Villa will push into the top 7 or so and will be pushing for Europa League football. Fancy United/Liverpool to dethrone City.

And if Kane and Grealish are signed by Pep?

I do think the winners will have to hit the mid-90s in terms of points.

Couldn't see Pep signing both but possibly one of them. You are correct there is no doubt both of them are serious losses to their clubs and serious gains for City. However, I can't see Kane moving away this year but Grealish probably will. I thought Villa were formidable enough last year in his absence. Early days yet but.

Anybody any bold predictions? I think Leeds will suffer a strong case of second season syndrome and be fighting for survival. I also believe Aston Villa will push into the top 7 or so and will be pushing for Europa League football. Fancy United/Liverpool to dethrone City.

Assume Tyrone will line up the same? Kennedy second half and Cathal McShane introduction will give them something to think about.

Donaghy maybe get another chance following his league performance against Donegal.

Kennedy will surely have to start ahead of Richie Donnelly.
Donaghy also surely has to go if either McKenna or McShane are fit to go from the start.

Kennedy must be included however I would move Richie in to full forward. On his day he can do damage.

[Dromore]

My very early predictions of the championship first round this year. Few hard picks.

Preliminary Round
Ardboe vs. Dromore
Derrylaughan vs. Moy

First Round
Clonoe vs. Errigal Ciaran
Derrylaughan/Moy vs. Loughmacrory
Edendork vs. Coalisland
Omagh vs. Carrickmore
Dungannon vs. Ardboe/Dromore
Pomeroy vs. Eglish
Killyclogher vs. Donnaghmore
Trillick vs. Galbally

https://www.irishtimes.com/sport/gaelic-games/malachy-clerkin-dublin-won-t-win-the-all-ireland-this-year-1.4621345

Malachy Clerkin: Dublin won't win the All-Ireland this year

For the first time in almost a decade, they've the look of a team who lack firepower


Malachy Clerkin



Dublin won't win the All-Ireland this year. Somebody will beat them at some stage over the next seven weeks. Could be Kerry at the end, could be Mayo in the semi-final, could be one of the northern teams if one of the other two fall before then. We know not the day nor the power. But it will happen.
This is not meant to be provocative. Truth be told, it's as much a shock to this column as it is to anyone to realise it. If it feels like an outlandish thing to declare, that's only because this is the first time in the past nine years when you could have felt confident even bringing it up.
Think back over it. At no stage during the six-in-a-row could you have banged your fist on the table and declared the Dubs would be beaten. The last time they lost a championship game was, famously, in 2014, a game that Donegal went into as the biggest outsiders in an All-Ireland semi-final for 20 years. The year before that was Jim Gavin's first, when he unleashed Jack McCaffrey, Paul Mannion, Dean Rock et al on the championship and danced them all into submission.
For the first time in almost a decade, they have the look of a team who lack the firepower to pull it off
Oh, there have been your hunches and your feelings and your just-might-bes down the years. The mind drifts to Colm Parkinson's podcast the week before the Dubs played Tyrone in 2017 where neither of his guests predicted a Dublin win. Stevie McDonnell and Conan Doherty - no mug, either of them - got to the verdicts at the end and went for a draw (McDonnell) and a Tyrone win (Doherty). Woolly himself was the rock of sense in the group but even he went for Tyrone to cover the three-point spread.
The point is, we've all taken a swing from time to time. We've all written match previews where we were, in Seán Moran's great phrase, "attempting to look wise after the event, before the event". This column is far from immune, having spent most of the years between 2011 and 2015 indulging in a frankly weird mania for giving the verdict to underdogs in matches against the Kilkenny hurlers. The thinking was probably that it would turn out to be right eventually. What an idiot.
Anyway, this is not that. Obviously if we start predicting on an annual basis that Dublin won't win the All-Ireland, the year will come around where that will be the case. But that's stopped clock stuff, of no use to anybody. It's not the point of the exercise here.
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The loss of Stephen Cluxton is a real thing. Ditto the loss of Jack McCaffrey and Paul Mannion and Cian O'Sullivan. File photograph: Bryan Keane/Inpho

No, it's more that we should all take a minute to mark the novelty of the moment we have. Breathe the air, take in the day. Recognise that at the sharp end of things at least, there is a championship afoot. The scandal of kicking the lower orders out after one game is a stain on it all but we can talk about that some other time.
This is about rejoicing in the fact that for this summer at least, the whole thing isn't a done deal. For all of Dublin's inarguable qualities throughout the Gavin era and last year, the chronic predictability of it all has been a pair of concrete slippers for the championship as a whole. We can admire Dublin and still want to puke at how straightforward they have made it.
Mayo's repeated and epic refusals to bow down is what endeared them to so many people along the way. Even at the height of that great rivalry though, you always felt on some level that you were stretching the arguments for Mayo in the build-up to games in a way you didn't have to do for Dublin. There were too many ifs and buts and ultimately, when it came down to it, you half-knew all the time that Dublin's bench would decide it in the end.
Things are different this year. The last time you could sit down mid-championship and be adamant that Dublin weren't going to win it all was in August 2012 when Pat Gilroy's team scraped past Laois in the last eight of their All-Ireland defence. They had already been unconvincing against Wexford and Meath in Leister and the key score in the Laois game was a goal from a deflection by Michael Darragh Macauley. They were anything but back-to-back champions in waiting and so it proved against Mayo next day out.
The championship has changed in the meantime and clearly there is no real danger to Dublin in Leinster. Meath will presumably feel every bit of the great vengeance and furious anger routine this coming Sunday and neither Kildare nor Westmeath are up to it either. But they will have to win two serious games against two serious teams after that. And for the first time in almost a decade, they have the look of a team who lack the firepower to pull it off.
The loss of Stephen Cluxton is a real thing. Ditto the loss of McCaffrey and Mannion and Cian O'Sullivan. But just as real is the gradual erosion of their cast of bit-part heroes. There's no Darren Daly to send on to do a job in any one of the defensive positions. There's no Paddy Andrews or Kevin McManamon to bring in as soon as one of the shooters kicks two wides. There's no Macauley to thud into midfield to change the tempo and tenor of a game.
Maybe these roles are going to be filled by Tom Lahiff and Peadar Ó Coifigh Byrne and the Basquel brothers and Aaron Byrne and Séan McMahon and Seán Bugler and Cillian O'Shea and Shane Carthy. But nobody knows that yet and so there's no reason for anyone to fear the reaper when Dublin start emptying the bench.
It would obviously be wrong to posit that Kerry or Mayo or Donegal or whoever have a more proven squad than Dublin. That is just not true. Dessie Farrell's side did win an All-Ireland just over seven months ago, after all.
But every one of those good teams must surely see Dublin in a reduced state and have immortal words of the British cox in an Olympic rowing event years ago ringing in their ears. If not now, when? If not you, who?
For the first time in years, mark this column down as one who doesn't see the answer being the obvious.

I agree with this column but I still believe Dublin will win the AI. This is due something not touched on in this report;

The weakness of the other competition.

Don't get me wrong, Kerry are a formidable side that has players like Dave Clifford and Sean O'Shea who have football hanging out of them. However the rest of the field such as Mayo, Tyrone or Donegal are just not on Dublin or Kerry's level. This was proven in Kerry's complete annihilation of the O'Neill County in the league semi-final. Dublin do look exposed this year however I think the minimal fans suits Dublin as they are trained like pro athletes to block out every distraction. I predict Dublin will have their 7 in a row but it won't be as convincing as the past couple of years.

I am surprised! Would love to know how it was overturned. As soft as the strike might have been, it was a red card all day every day, and twice on a sunday

If they can show a similar incident with no sending off or able to interpret the rules to fit their case then it will cast doubt over the call.

Personally it was a very soft red, I don't dish out too many cards so for me it needs to be malicious over the top stuff, and if the other player over eggs his reaction then he'll not get much sympathy

It's a great day for face slappers all over the country.

If Paul Brennan didn't get a red last year for slapping a tyrone player in the back of the head then McNamee definitely wasnt a red. Simple.

Its not that simple at all.

Brennan got a yellow on the field. That meant it was done and over with. Had he got a red (which he easily could have) I seriously doubt if Donegal would have gone down the legal technicality route.

Of course they wouldnt! Because it was blatant strike to the back of the head.

i thought we had 16 teams in division 1 so why preliminary rounds can someone explain.

Due to COVID no teams were relegated last year but 2 teams came up. Usually 2 goes down and 2 goes up. 4 teams will be relegated this year to compensate

Out of Ulster anyway, I fancy a Tyrone v Armagh final

Does anybody fancy Armagh to go all the way?