DERRY V FERMANAGH Healy Park Sat 21st June Throw in: 6pm

[glenullinabu]

Analyists/Experts/Posters : Please, please, please stop being so patronising! This wee Fermanagh thing has been annoying me for years and the fact that it is still trotted out is silly (trying to keep the language clean). We were a Division 1 that got shafted in the new format. Have been highly competitive when you take out the teams that have won AI's in the last 5 years and yet still we get this patronising crap. Someone posted that they can't see us having a chance against Armagh, why???

whose bein patronising?  better fermanagh teams have wasted leads against armagh in recent years
its well recognised that ferm seem to freeze against armagh (aiqf few years ago apart)
i would love to see new champs in ulster - i said i hoped i was wrong but we'll see
come on fermanagh

[screenexile]

Ok here's my take on things.

Fermanagh were FAR better than us in every area of the pitch! The reason for this was the system that O'Rourke has used to let them play to our strengths. I outlined 3 ways that we would best Fermanagh 1. Work the ball in 2. Put Muldoon in FF and play long ball into him 3. Take Long range points. For the first 15 mins we worked the ball in and got serious reward for it and I was cconvinced we had the game sown up if we continued to play like that. Then what did we do? Decided to hoof balls in from all angles to a Fermanagh defence that had 4 men on Paddy Bradley... this continued for the entirity of the game and nobody changed f**k all!

For us I thought McGuckin was good (glenullinabu seems to have a personal vendetta against him I don't know why) as he robbed his man maybe 3 times and was out in front as much as he could be given the space the Ferm forwards got. McCusker, Gilligan and Bradley were also good and after that we had nothing.

Our midfield was exposed something serious yesterday. Given the conditions there was no possible reason to have 4 men in there who can catch a ball when there wasn't a clean catch to be had. What happened was they jumped on top of eachother and invariably the ball fell into a Fermanagh defenders hands. That is where we miss Doherty because on a day like that he is the man to dive on top of those breaking balls and get the dirty work done for us.

As for the ref and the pulling and hauling well it seemed to me Fermanagh were keen to foul away down the pitch to stop us getting early ball in and if Sherry's was a 2nd booking it was completely deserved. Having said that both teams were using the 3rd man tackle all day long and the ref didn't do anything about it. Poor ref and very inconsistent but nothing to do with why we lost the game.

I think our management were shown up badly yesterday as not having any tailored gameplan. The subs we introduced weren't going to change the game and didn't have much of an impact at all. As for the Paddy Bradley situation they should have sacrificed him getting 5/6 points and use him as a decoy to pull Fermanagh defenders out of the way for someone else to take over the mantle of scoring... that's why it's a team game!!

Fermanagh are an excellent team! Well drilled, fit as hell (much fitter than our lads), hungry, great spirit, fantastic belief in themselves, a tight gameplan (and I'm sure anothe one or two tucked away should one not work). Armagh or Down will have their fill of it against them and if Down progress I fancy Fermanagh to beat them but I think Armagh will win Ulster now as they will not be as tacticaly naive as we were yesterday.

As for where to now we jus have to wait for the qualifier draw an try and build things back up. We still have the players to win an All Ireland I am convinced of it and if Doherty had played yesterday I think we would have won. In all seriousness though I think this year is a write off. We need a new manager next year to come in and have a bit of tactical awareness and who isn't afraid to lay down a few home truths to a few players. We still have a relatively young squad that can win more! I just don't think it will be this year.

Anyway Fermanagh will have my full support for the Final and fai play to McElroy I hope he can bring an Ulster medal back to the club! Fermanagh abú!

[gaagaa]

For us I thought McGuckin was good (glenullinabu seems to have a personal vendetta against him I don't know why) as he robbed his man maybe 3 times and was out in front as much as he could be given the space the Ferm forwards got. McCusker, Gilligan and Bradley were also good and after that we had nothing.

As for the Paddy Bradley situation they should have sacrificed him getting 5/6 points and use him as a decoy to pull Fermanagh defenders out of the way for someone else to take over the mantle of scoring... that's why it's a team

i dunno about the vendetta thing with glenullinabu- im not sure kevin is as good as he was either - full back line has been a problem for a while
i totally agree derry could have used pb as a decoy - it would have surprised fermanagh as they wouldnt have been expecting that
fermanagh have excellent footballers who are now having a bit of belief in themselves

[the green man]

Gentlemen. Kevin McGuckin is a class footballer, that any county team would by glad of. Lets stop this nonsence that he is past his sell by date.

[orangeman]

I've yet to see it mentioned here, maybe I'm the only one that thought it, but the two Bradley's attitude is beyond rotten. A pair of ill mannered, disrespectful cnuts, in particular their attitude to Crozier and McCloskey.

Are you surprised at that ??

[orangeman]

I'd have to agree with Greenman - Kevin Mc Guckin is one of the best defenders in Ireland -
I don't know what has happened Mc Cloy after being the best full back in Ireland bar none last year  - maybe the All Star ?

Had Gilligan scored the penalty, Derry would have been out of sight and could have won by 10  - that was the turning point, no doubt.

[orangeman]

Why, thank you. All-round good gaels.

[the green man]

Why, thank you. All-round good gaels.

Aren't yis. I was going to propose that it was the same as Ballinderry commmeting on Moortown/Ardboe, but then I realised that them'un's would never come close to that standard, and deceiced to leave it.

[Orior]

Just to rub salt into Derry's wounds, you'll be fined £500 for going to the wrong goals for the pre-match warm up.

[gerry]

great result yesterday, its there best chance for a ulster title this year

[screenmachine]

As for the Paddy Bradley situation they should have sacrificed him getting 5/6 points and use him as a decoy to pull Fermanagh defenders out of the way for someone else to take over the mantle of scoring... that's why it's a team game!!

I could just see this now...
Paddy Crozier - "Right Paddy I'm going to use you as a decoy, run out to a corner and we'll kick the ball into the other corner where we'll have at least one free man who can do the damage, ok?"

Paddy Bradley - "I'm not playing. Eoin lets go."

Eoin Bradley - "Ok, f**k you Crozier."

[Maguire01]

Just to rub salt into Derry's wounds, you'll be fined £500 for going to the wrong goals for the pre-match warm up.

What's the point in a £500 fine? If a punishment isn't prohibitive, it's pointless.

[ONeill]

Aren't yis. I was going to propose that it was the same as Ballinderry commmeting on Moortown/Ardboe, but then I realised that them'un's would never come close to that standard, and deceiced to leave it.

I see you haven't learned the Englsih yet, but passable.

Glad to see Fermanagh wans getting a big day out in July. That usually meant a trip to Lough Derg. God Bless 'em.

[haranguerer]

As for the Paddy Bradley situation they should have sacrificed him getting 5/6 points and use him as a decoy to pull Fermanagh defenders out of the way for someone else to take over the mantle of scoring... that's why it's a team game!!

I could just see this now...
Paddy Crozier - "Right Paddy I'm going to use you as a decoy, run out to a corner and we'll kick the ball into the other corner where we'll have at least one free man who can do the damage, ok?"

Paddy Bradley - "I'm not playing. Eoin lets go."

Eoin Bradley - "Ok, f**k you Crozier."

They should have a gaa spitting image with wee puppets and all. I can see this scene im my head!!

[Bogball XV]

i thought the standard was well above the tripe served out yesterday in healy park (those grapes are still very bitter), obviously a totally different style of football, but at least it was a bit entertaining for the neutral.
TV3's commentary and analysts are pretty good too.

Yesterday's game was highly entertaining.

obviously i didn't find it entertaining at all, i genuinely thought it was poor fare, it may have been a good result for fermanagh and the neutrals, but there wasn't a pile of football played (bar skinner's goal).

Pathetic, have you watched the game again? Hope the Derry management and players don't have the same attitude as you or Derry have no chance of re-grouping and maximising their potential.

Delighted for Wexford, and agree about Forde. He'll be bursting himself for the final.
Just can never understand Laois and all this underage potential, must be a b**tard of a team to support.

Nope, haven't watched it again yet, but I will - I can't understand how you think a derry supporter could find that match decent, we didn't score for nearly an hour, not exactly entertaining.  Anyway, I promise to watch it again and try and do so with a more open mind this time round - i'll even see if maybe I was a bit harsh about fermanagh's tactics for the last 10 mins (at least they had tactics).
The problem with paddy being a decoy runner was that there was't anyone else to take a score, why leave devlin on the bench until the last 5??  Puzzling, like virtually everything else.  One other thing, paddy did free up the space for eoin's goal by making a decoy run.