Cork v Kildare

Their number 5 will certainly break the gain line.

I think we'll need Hank for the line outs,

Cork 4/7, Kildare 7/4.. draw 15/2.

If Cork are missing Walsh, Cadogan and Shields then the 7/4 looks a tempting price for us.
Any news on the injury front for us this weekend?

I see a lot of our lads played in the Sigerson cup this week. Hopefully they all came out of it unscathed.

I'm not singling out Bolton in particular, it just so happens he's the number 6 at the moment and while I admire him as a good player his style does't sit with my view of what a no 6 should do. The best centre back we ever had imo never followed anyone all over the field, he commanded an area and very few players were able to take him on, only one springs to mind, Ja Fallon

Lads the game has moved on from a designated Centre Back. Gone are the days of one fella commanding an area so to speak. The likes of Lacey, Brennan and Vaughan spend as much time attacking as defending.

I really dont understand all this talk of needing a stopper at Chb. We need to stop teams building up a head of steam coming from the oppositions half back and midfield. Its thats or a gung ho shootout with teams.

hawker wrote:

Lads the game has moved on from a designated Centre Back. Gone are the days of one fella commanding an area so to speak. The likes of Lacey, Brennan and Vaughan spend as much time attacking as defending.

I really dont understand all this talk of needing a stopper at Chb. We need to stop teams building up a head of steam coming from the oppositions half back and midfield. Its thats or a gung ho shootout with teams.

Nail on the head hawker,the game has evolved. A lot of players who were excellent back 15 or 20 years ago wouldn't be able to cope in todays game.

Ger Brennan is probably the closest example of a centre back who tries to hold the middle and he has been taken off regularly last year to be replaced by Cian O'Sullivan who is a tight marker. Look at how they switched him on to Gooch last year in the semi final.

Hmm I thought this new fangled sweeper type guy was a centre back in disguise

I want a big, strong, play making, commanding, mobile, nippy centre back who can hold the centre and support the full back line but also get forward and support the forward line.

A love child of maybe Glen Ryan, Niall Buckley, Colm Cooper and Bernard Brogan. With modern science who knows.

I'd agree with Topcat on the forwards tackling and how it is a very effective way to cut out the exposure that our defence has been getting. If you looked at Dublin and Donegal forwards tackling over the past couple of years there is actually a structure to what they are doing. Mayo have also worked hard at this aspect of the game.
Theres no point in a forward rushing in to a lad in posession at the 21 yard line leaving a free player to take an easy pass and move up the field with momentum. Forwards need to play smart and create a more difficult hurdle on the 45 to 65yd area, at the least what this achieves if not a dispossession is a slow down in the build up play. It allows more players to funnell back and cover and puts more pressure on through balls by clogging up the space.
Easier said than done, but you cant just expect to have an effect by yourself charging into an isolated area with no back up, better to allow the corner back run for a while than give him a handy out.
Another major problem is turning over posession in the midield area, loose handpassing or poor kickouts if you do this you are wide open.
Bolton is looking sharper this year and is a quality player and his passing is usually good, needs to concentrate on defending more but seems to be going that way.

Think Fergal Conway would be suitable for the centre box role.. Hes as strong as an ox but also has pace to get forward and support the attack when needed.. Think Bolton is suited to wing back if I am honest..

Fergal's a good young player but he's not the answer for centre back. He struggled badly in the championship for Celbridge and against Galway in last years u21 semi final.

I think the best man for the role is Mick Foley. He's struggling badly in the fb line but i think he'd solve the problems at centre back.

Kildare team for Sunday. Mark Donnellan back in goals. Kevin Murnaghan at corner back and Fergal Conway at wing back.

1. Mark Donnellan
2. Mick O’Grady
3. Mick Foley
4. Kevin Murnaghan
5. Fergal Conway
6. Emmet Bolton
7. Paul Cribbin
8. Tommy Moolick
9. Gary White
10. Cathal McNally
11. Eoghan O’Flaherty
12. Sean Hurley
13. Paddy Brophy
14. Tomás O’Connor
15. Darroch Mulhall

1. Ken O’Halloran (Bishopstown)
2. John McLoughlin (Kanturk)
3. Tom Clancy (Clonakilty)
4. Conor Dorman (Bishopstown)
5. Brian O’Driscoll (Tadhg MacCárthaigh)
6. Fintan Goold (Macroom)
7. James Loughrey (Mallow)
8. Andrew O’Sullivan (Castletownbere)
9. Ruairi Deane (Bantry Blues)
10. Mark Collins (Castlehaven)
11. Donncha O’Connor (Ballydesmond)
12. John O’Rourke (Carbery Rangers)
13. Daniel Goulding (Éire Óg)
14. Brian Hurley (Castlehaven)
15. Donal Og Hodnett (O'Donovan Rossa)

Look beatable, Bolton be well able for OConnor if thats how they match up. Keeping Brian Hurley quiet is not easy but if its done I'd give us a good chance.

Be interesting to see how Murno gets on corner back (not his best position) especially if he lines up on Goulding who is probably the best of the 6 forwards names there.

God that's a weak full back line.With the forwards cork have we're in big trouble.

Is there any doubt that game will go ahead? Forecast not great. Want to book train tickets but don't fancy wasting the money if it's cancelled. It's hard to know what to do

Things are grand down here in Cork. Game will go ahead

topcat wrote:

Be interesting to see how Murno gets on corner back (not his best position) especially if he lines up on Goulding who is probably the best of the 6 forwards names there.

+ 1.

Kildare to line out as selected

Kildare just shy in Cork but what has happened to the Royal project which was supposed to be ready to take the Dubs this summer

Full time: Monaghan 0-20 Meath 0-8

A great win for the Ulster champions.

1pt defeat really masks the poor performance. Turned over loads of possession and again like last week conceded many scores from our own mistakes.

Could easily have conceded 5 goals whilst only creating one clear chance ourselves. This is a cork team missing top class regulars. Very disappointing after the great start last weekend.

Disappointing that there is no evident pattern to our play or a game plan. I really hope our long term plan is not to outshoot teams. Because at the moment our defence is very leaky. 2-18 last week and 16 points this week and could have been more. 36 scores in 2 games.

Didn't really get going much in the second half, went at least 10 mins without a score at one stage. Cork looked pretty comfortable at times and any time we managed a score they were able to respond straight away.

Made it hard for ourselves with big gaps again between the middle third and the full forward line, Brophy and Mulhall may as well have been playing midfield for parts of it as they had to go looking for ball, which then meant O'Connor was completely isolated so even if he was getting ball he had it all to do on his own.

Hurley put in another big shift in midfield, won a good amount of ball and was the only real option we seemed to have there at times.

Carved open a couple of times in the first half, could have been two or three goals down if it wasn't for some poor finishing from some of the Cork forwards, they probably doubled our wide tally too.

Could have gotten a result out of it if it wasn't for some missed chances in the second half but then again Cork could and probably should have been out of sight by the time we got the goal.

Not good, not good at all.
Same old failures bubble to the surface. No protection through the middle, cheap frees given away, loosing possession in dangerous positions by messing about, poor shooting, fullback line in trouble and conceding scores with no pressure on the shot.

No idea what our game plan is, Brophy our best forward last week playing way to deep, O'Connor isolated again.

Playing against half a Cork team at best we could have let five goals in. We could have let five in last week. We have Tyrone and Dublin coming up and they won't be so generous. Derry beating Kerry today has put the pressure in us now as it's looking like six points will be needed to stay up.
Back down to Earth with a massive bump.