NFL Div 2 2020

[High Fielder]

In fairness to Ballyroan Abu, he's been beating this drum for a while. Quirke will be judged by how successful he is in getting us in to Tier 1. As a county though, we're not developing at all if what is coming through is being ignored. I hate saying this, but I see no benefit at all in playing Ross at this stage. I thought he really struggled yesterday and got far longer than he should have. I couldn't imagine any circumstances yesterday where 3 or 4 younger lads, including Sean Moore, couldn't have done better. I hate personalising this, but it really annoyed me, and I love Ross. But we have to plan for the future always, whatever level that may be.

[County Man]

Read this every day but seldom post.

A few thoughts on the league so far facing into the last two rounds.

First of all, 5 points from 5 games is something a lot of us would have taken in January.
We were favourites to get relegated.

On a side note, the GAA will have to sort out the overall fixtures in the calender. I believe that one of the main priorities of the new incoming GAA president is to fix this. Playing the majority of our games for the year in February and March is madness.


The point we got in Roscommon could be invaluable. We played well that day and showed a great attitude. Some great points scored in both halves and then 2 stunning goals at the end. Great to see Cahir Healy return in the second half, Corbet was very good and Lillis played a captain's part.


The performance v Armagh was wonderful especially the first half. Timmon's with that wonder point and holding them to two points. We showed great bottle and resolve when they cameback in the second half but a fine win. Mark Barry had a fine game.


The Cavan game should not have been played! Dreadful conditions. In fairness Cavan were very impressive even if the scoreline flattered them in the end.


We bounced back well down in Ennis. A lot say it was a lucky win but I believe we totally deserved it. The first half we dominated with Evan O'Carroll and Eoin Lowry and Ross on fire. Brian Byrne had a fine game and is one of our best newcomers. Sean Byrne was desperately unlucky not to get a goal midway into the second half that would have had us cruising. Underside of the crossbar. Clare's late penalty was very soft as it hit the back of the Laois defender.


Never nice to lose to Kildare but they deserved it on the day. The early scores were a massive lift to them and they bossed midfield. Having said that, we had a few goal chances.


Overall though we have showed a great attitude. We keep battling hard in the matches and have a good mixture of youth and experience with more to come back from injuries. Two massive games left and hopefully we can get two positive results.


Finally, we need more support. Its the least that the players deserve. Outnumbered strongly by Armagh and Kildare at home is disappointing. Championship type crowd in Roscommon and one would be envious of their support.

[Laois Rising]

Good post County Man.

The third game three weeks on the trot I think had a bearing on the Kildare performance. They were much faster out of the blocks than we were and dominated the middle third for large parts of the game. Five points at this stage is very satisfactory return. However, we will need to pick up a win in our final two games to guarantee safety and both are away. It would be very disappointing if we did end up being relegated from division two. A lot of young players have come in over the last 12/24 months and are beginning to step up this year. In twelve months time I would be very optimistic that this team will be able to kick on even further. Having games against division two opposition again next year will be crucial to that development. The more games young players can get playing at the higher level can only be good for their development. Stepping back down to tussles with Offaly, Leitrim, Antrim and Limerick next year won't provide that.   

[The Boy Wonder]

Next week's game in Mullingar is a must-win for Laois. If all home teams were to win in Round 6 then Laois would be second from bottom on 5 points and the 3 teams above us on 6 points (Cavan, Clare, Kildare) all have home games in the final round.
It's possible that we could lose to Westmeath, beat Fermanagh in Round 7 and still be relegated. Hopefully this scenario won't happen.

[recyclebin]

Too many what ifs yet. We could go second if results go our way next weekend too! Wins for us, Kildare and Roscommon would put us level on points with Armagh and ahead of them on head to head.

[Joeythelips]

Brilliant post on here from Countyman, sums it up perfectly.

We came into this year fearful of getting a few hidings and heading back to Div 3 sharpish. We had an ageing squad with an unproven manager and not much talent coming through it seemed yet apart from the Kildare game (I agree that the Cavan game was a write off due to conditions) we have played reasonably well and we have seen consistently at all levels that teams playing 3 weeks in a row struggle.

What we have seen is that our younger players are developing all the time, they will learn loads from this league and hopefully they can avoid the drop as it will be a stronger league again next year with Cork and Meath in the mix (better yet get promoted to Div 1). So far they have done themselves proud, if I was told they would have 2 games left against Westmeath and Fermanagh with a chance of promotion still there I would have snapped your hand off, yet here we are. Well done lads, so far so good, 2 wins from last 2 games and who knows we may even be on for 3 promotions in succession which would be incredible.

Its vital given we will have a tricky championship game coming up against Longford/ Louth (I expect Longford to win that and they are always tricky opponents for us).

[Laoiseabu]

Beaten by tipp footballers by a couple of points last night in thurles . Anyone know the team that was out ?

[redsetanta]

I see where Gareth Dillon and Paul Kingston have re-joined the panel but Donie has stayed away. Sean Moore was asked in as well.

[Heshs Umpire]

Anyone got any idea what starting team might be?

Something like this wouldn't be bad;

Corbett,
Collins, Timmons, Piggott
O'Flynn, Begley, Dillon
O'Loughlin, Lillis
Lowry, P Kingston, Carroll
Barry, O'Carroll, Walsh

[Laoiseabu]

I'd go with :

Corbett
S Lacey Timmons Pigott
P Kirwan Begley Dillon
O'Loughlin Lillis
Carroll P Kingston Scully
Owens O Carroll D Whelan

[The PRO]

I'd go with :

Corbett
S Lacey Timmons Pigott
P Kirwan Begley Dillon
O'Loughlin Lillis
Carroll P Kingston Scully
Owens O Carroll D Whelan

I don't think Scully is fit to play? Had a bad year injury wise.

[Laoiseabu]

Yeah I think scully is actually injured . I'm picking the team off form in the club championship so far . I'd probably put Garry Comerford, Brian Byrne or Eoin Lowry in at 12 to replace scully so .

[The PRO]

Yeah I think scully is actually injured . I'm picking the team off form in the club championship so far . I'd probably put Garry Comerford, Brian Byrne or Eoin Lowry in at 12 to replace scully so .

Lowry's injured too! And Comerford is not on the panel.

I don't think a game as important as this is one where we should hand out three or four debuts. I'd be inclined to go with experienced inter county players but the likes of Owens, Moore, Lacey, Coffey and Whelan are definitely ones for the future.

[Giovanni]

Is Brody out of favour for some reason? I thought he has been excellent for Laois since he's come in.

[Junior Ex Laoistalk]

If anyone wants to see this game tomorrow it's available on GAA.GO

Go here to buy it, its only €5.
https://www.gaago.ie/fixture/PL5-20-F-W9B

GAAGO works on almost every up-to-date browser on almost every modern device, so if you have a reasonable specification tablet or computer that is less than 3 years old, it will probably work.

GAAGO also works on Roku devices based in the US - please ensure that your Roku's software is up-to-date for GAAGO to work properly.

In order to stream GAAGO on your device, you will need a strong, stable broadband internet connection with a minimum of 2MB to stream at the lowest bitrate of 240p (a mobile 3g, 4G, LTE, etc. internet service will probably be too weak or too variable to give a good service) and a ping of less than 100m/s. The higher your download speeds, the better the quality your streaming video will be. You should achieve HD quality (720p) at 5MB.

You will need a computer, tablet or mobile smartphone device (such as an iPhone or Android smartphone), and it should be running a compatible web browser such as Chrome, Mozilla Firefox or Safari.