Sligo Club Football & Hurling

[Davitt Man]

I dunno lads its hard to break into that top trio of Curry\Tourlestrane\Harps, but keep trying!!

[Stagmeister]

Sure thats Sligo football for yeah...prob one of the toughest club scenes in the country!!!

[Stagmeister]

Ballymote drew with Easkey ( 0 - 12 to 1 - 9)
Bunnies beat Curry
Tourlestrane beat Harps
Marys beat Castleconnor

[magpie seanie]

So as I feared I only got 1 out of 4!

Our first teams game v. Enniscrone was called off due to a bereavament in the Enniscrone club. Our seconds lost by 5 to St. Molaise despite being 2-3 to 0-0 down after 10 minutes playing with the wind!

[magpie seanie]

Could have sworn I saw the Sligo GAA results on Aertel last night but they don't seem to be there now.

I think I remember most of them anyway. On top the results posted above in 1B Farnan's beat St. John's, Tubber beat Drumcliffe and Shamrock Gaels beat Calry by a goal. In 2A Geevagh beat local rivals St. Michaels, Harps hammered Coolaney/Mullinabreena and Pats beat Owenmore Gaels by 2. In 2B Curry and michaels received walkovers from Mary's and Easkey respectively. Ballisodare also won but can't remember who won between Farnan's and Cloonacool.

In the North Div JFC Molaise Gaels beat Mary's by a point and John's beat Calry by 2 points. The North semis take place on Friday night and are as follows: Molaise v. Drumcliffe; John's v. Coolera. Final is down for June 9th in Markievicz Park (allegedly!).

How are the junior c'ships progressing in other divisions?

[Teeling Gael]

Results were definitely up on Aertel last night. Cloonacool beat Farnans 0-13 to 2-5 I think, in that remaining match. 2b has turned into a joke and relegation into it is totally unpalatable and this joke of a division were there is only at best 5 committed teams cannot be allowed continue. We are struggling now and lost what I can only describe as the worst match I ever played in on Saturday night to an equally poor St Pats.Thankfully no one had to pay in !!  Hopefully we can turn a corner in the next 3 crucial matches for us but with 0-6 , 1-4 and 0-6 been our last 3 scores its easy to see where our problems lie. Geevagh , harps and Grange are fighting it out for promotion and everyone else is fighting for survival in 2A. Countywide the standout result for me was Farnans thrashing of Johns. Surely Johns had their county players available. Can't help you Seanie on other junior championships as they seem even more low proflie than ever. Finally the fixtures committee / website seem to be reeling from Fergal Henrys resignation with results / fixtures no longer consistently on it. You are better off with no website than an out of date one and commercially the website should be a valuable source of revenue with advertising but sadly that seems a million years away.

Easy knowing we lost at the weekend isn't it !!!

[magpie seanie]

Div 2B wasn't a joke last year because the two of us were in it and Mary's were also decent. Things seem to have imploded there a bit this season so far.

Staying in 2A is still possible for us but we've a huge mountain to climb. Really we need to get some points on the board asap but with our fixtures piling up it's not great. If we win on Friday night we will have two weekends in a row of 3 fixtures for the club with a senior game this Wednesday to boot. All this in prime Leaving Cert season (we will not have 1 minor playing any of these games for us).

Fergal Henry's loss is huge. None of the rest have email!

[magpie seanie]

Our seniors beat Enniscrone 0-15 to 0-10 last night to reclaim top spot in 1B. Made to work all the way by a committed Enniscrone with Mark Gordon taking some ridiculous points. They are the only team bar ourselves to take points off Tubber yet they are rock bottom of the table. In that division we have Drumcliffe/Rosses Point on Saturday and we will be without our county players so that will be pretty tough.

A busy weekend starts for us with the Divisional Junior c'ship semi final on Firday night v. St. John's. We should have a decent outfit but there's nothing they love more than beating us. In 2B we play Owenmore Gaels (I think on Monday) and the two sides must be getting sick of the sight of each other. We badly need some points soon to have any hope of avoiding the drop but our opponents also need the points to ease their own worries. Could be another good game. We've developed a nasty habit of losing important games to Owenmore Gaels by a point or two. I suppose how we come through the Friday game will tell a lot for us for Monday.

[Teeling Gael]

Hard to see your Intermediate team avoiding relegation Seanie if ye dont beat us on Monday ( 6pm ??) as i reckon you would need minimun 10 points to avoid relegation in that division. In fairness despite all our meetings, there hasn't developed any animosity between the teams and it should be an open game. Best of luck on Friday night against Johns. Ye deserve it after the major injustice of last years intermediate championship but  with a combination of regrading and senior players been away or injured in previous summer there always is some club waiting in the long grass in the junior championship.

Have the senior county players been given the go ahead to play club football this weekend ??

[magpie seanie]

Yeah, both our teams are footballing team so that's probably the reason that there's no bad blood. Both teams try to play football and don't really have any hatchet men. The games are usually open and good to watch too. Agree that 10 points is probably required and if we lose on Monday (6pm - yes, that's what I hear too) that tally would be hard to achieve. Still, from now on we should be a bit stronger with 3rd level finished so I'd expect us to pick up points in 2nd half of league. We haven't had our main forward (Fenton) for any league game so far for a variety of reasons and that should change too. We have not really used any minors this year either as the club minor squad is quite tight and couldn't afford injuries. The minors are going well in the league and given our lack of success at this grade over the years relegation to 2B would be a small price to pay for a minor league or championship title.

My understanding is that the county players are not available this weekend. That is consistent with what Breheny usually asks for and gets.

Last years intermediate relegation was a really tough one to take but its no guarantee of success at Junior. Technically, Michael McNamara could tog out against us tomorrow night  .

[Teeling Gael]

Seen Fenton at a tag rugby event last Thursday night and he still looks in good shape though. The couple of minors ye had last year made a big difference to your intermediate team so they are undoubted losses. How is C brennans injury ??

You have confirmed what I suspected about county players. From my calculations they will be absent for minimum 5 out of the next 6 rounds of the league. Dont know if 1 competitive match with your club in the six weeks between Connaught Championship matches is adequate.

Mc Garty due to his travels has often been eligible for Junior and has played , so T Brehony is the only man who guarantees you Mc Namaras absence !!

[magpie seanie]

Well if McNamara plays against us on Friday then our county lads should play for us on the Saturday. Reckon he won't be seen there though.

Fenton has been training away and has actually played a few senior games as sub - its just that he's been away on holidays and with work commitments and has missed all the league games.

C. Brenan's injury woes continue. It's unlikely he'll be fully fit for the minor championship though fingers crossed. Some of the others have been involved with the county minors (3 and a 4th on and off the panel) so with the leaving cert on top of that you have to be careful not to ask them to do too much.

[Fionntamhnach]

Lads, I was in Markievicz Park yesterday and several of the Sligo lads I spoke to said that it is rarely opened up for anything other than county games and adult club championship finals, and that no underage finals are held there? Is this the case? If so it seems to be a bit of a waste of a good ground - in saying that, the pitch was in great condition.

[Teeling Gael]

Tourlestrane and Harps are continuing to set the pace in 1A. On paper anyhow the result against Curry looked comfortable for Tourlestrane and they are motoring along very nicely. Despite Marys horrific start to the season , they can still avoid relegation.

Coolera look good in 1B where the big story is Johns collapse. After losing their manager last week , they get another thrashing this week and look to be staring relegation in the face. Enniscrone are also struggling badly and the run of defeats seem to be hitting morale as its seldom one sees senior teams giving walkovers. In lots of ways relegation may do them no harm as in 2A next year a run of wins could turn the team around.

The big 3 of harps , Mholaises and Geevagh continue to blaze a trail in 2A. Coolera need to win at least 4 out of their 6 remaining games and whilst judging their performmance against us on bank holiday Monday its possible, the distraction of the Junior will count against them. We had a good win against Coolaney yesterday who have some of the best players in the division but the stength of the overall panel is letting them down. Tactically some of the positioning of their stronger players is to say the least confusing.
Cloonacool and Curry look to be going straight back to 2A with surprise package St Michaels their closest rivals. From reading their club notes recently some of Michaels better intermediate players seem to be double jobbing but each club to their own. Ballisodare  are very disappointing all year and after last seasons promise seem to have gone backwards whilst the demise of St Marys was totally unexpected

[magpie seanie]

Lads, I was in Markievicz Park yesterday and several of the Sligo lads I spoke to said that it is rarely opened up for anything other than county games and adult club championship finals, and that no underage finals are held there? Is this the case? If so it seems to be a bit of a waste of a good ground - in saying that, the pitch was in great condition.

Fionntamhnach - yes, very much the case. They protect that place like a virgins honour! It is a shame alright but the pitch is always immaculate. Still, there'd be something wrong if it wasn't in tip top shape.

Tourlestrane are mowing down all before them alright. I think Mary's will escape relegation alright. Don't think they have ever been relegated in their history.

Our 1B game was called of due to a death in Shamrock Gaels country. Our squad is well stretched at present and we are doing well to be top.

In 2A we were left with nothing in the tank from the night before but put up a decent showing against Geevagh despite what the scoreline might say. Their 2 first half goals should clearly have been disallowed (and we told Eugene too!) but again our lack of scoring power was a huge factor. Geevagh will struggle in the SFC for sure. We look doomed to relegation and the fixture pile up isn't helping in this regard.

Michaels have almost the same team in 2A and 2B. A bit bizarre. Mary's slippage would be directly a result of their problems at senior level. Cloonacool and Curry going back up is no surprise.

As for the JFC well we took the North Division title in dramatic style with a late scoring burst after a poor second half performance. We were 0-7 to 1-2 up at half time playing quite well (should really have been much farther ahead) but the wheels came off in the second half and we trailed 0-7 to 1-5 with 5 minutes left. Eventually we woke up and took a few scores to get home on a scoreline of 1-9 to 1-6. Despite our club winning this cup on numerous occasions (I would guess about 8/9 times in the last 16 years) it is my first time to win it on the field. Don't know who we play in the county semi but we're hoping to go all the way. Anyone know how the other divisions went?