Kildare v Offaly

Yes - the glaring flaw in this display was not pushing on and demolishing them when we got the goal and went eight up. It was the same problem last week and it is a recurring theme with Kildare.

But we have three weeks to get more work done, so for me it's far for a dealbreaker. Also, unlike under J Ryan, when the heat came on, we held our heads and didn't totally fall apart, and that in itself is progress.

This is ground zero - Ryan seemed on one-man mission to destroy the Kildare senior team and he made considerable headway. We're starting in Div 3 with a young team. I'm not expecting miracles. There's plenty to work on, yes. Dublin, Mayo, Kerry and Donegal - if you were to suggest to these teams that we could beat them right now, after the laughter had died down, I'm pretty sure what the response would be.

But the team has shown glimpses of its potential and we're on target for promotion. That's a decent enough start for me as we assess Cian O'Neill's epic two-game tenure.

Was Ollie about to be taken off anyway prior to mistake ? I hope so. Otherwise, are management going to take off every player who makes an error ? If so, we'll have gone through our bench after 5 minutes

jj wrote:

Was Ollie about to be taken off anyway prior to mistake ? I hope so. Otherwise, are management going to take off every player who makes an error ? If so, we'll have gone through our bench after 5 minutes

No idea but sometimes a manager needs to make a point about what he expects of a player. Making a blind reverse pass in the last couple of minutes 35 metres from goal when you are under a bit of pressure is not the thing to do. 

This is not the weak Jason Ryan in charge now. O 'Neill looks like he has a mean streak which is no harm as I think a few players have been phoning it in over the last two years. I don't think he'll entertain that.

Kevin Feeley was the big plus, and Dan Flynn had a good game alongside him, we played some good football at times and should have won by more, though we are very dependent on Niall Kelly for creativity and scores.

Good to get the win and although we got sloppy, I never thought Offaly were good enough to come back. Great display by Kevin Feely and I thought Fergal Conway, Dan Flynn and Niall Kelly were good as well. I think the substitution of Ollie was planned before he made that pass. Powderley was stripped and ready to come on.

Although I'm a fan of kick-passing, I'm not really sure we have the inside forwards to play that style at the moment. Time and again the ball was kicked into Neil Flynn and Leper and mostly they didn't win it or, if they did, they were isolated in the corner and the move fizzled out. I think at times if the likes of Dan Flynn or Paul Cribbin ran at the Offaly defence, we could have got scores far easier.

That change was going to be made before Lyons' mistake, but O'Neill gave him a bollocking when he came off and rightly so, it was outrageous stuff.

Still think Lyons is best deployed at half back. There's a looseness about his play that always has me on edge when he's closer to goal.

Some may disagree, but I think Ollie is great at marking the small nippy corner forwards like Bernard Allen today and Ross Munnelly and Lundy previously. He finds it more difficult at times to mark the bigger forwards like Conor McManus.
Interesting that he was switched to wing back in the 2nd half today, when Allen went off. Made sense to me anyway.

Yeah I would agree with that - if you have a speed merchant or a tricky customer, Ollie is your man. But he can struggle against the more physical operators.

Bit shaky near the end but great to get another win today. Kevin Feely was great to watch. He has so much potential. If he keeps playing like that he'll definitely be one of the starting midfielders for the championship.

Daniel Flynn was impressive too and some great scores from Niall Kelly. McNally was good too and took the goal well. Happy to see Bolton back (got a big cheer when he came on, even bigger when he shoved an Offaly player after about 5 seconds).

Regarding Ollie Lyons, yes the sub was definitely ready to come on before he made that mistake.

I think we can take a bit from the opening two games. The main positive is that we're the only side who have maximum points and have a further three games at home leaving us in the driving seat for promotion straight back to Div 2. Achieving that is our main priority from this league campaign and we're well on our way.

Dan Flynn's form is very encouraging. He looks back to the player he was before he went to Australia. Paul Cribbin has yet to find form but when he does it gives us two serious ball carrying options who could hurt any team.

Kevin Feely will also be a serious addition if today is anything to go by. We haven't had a dominant fielder in a long time. Having the ability to pressure the opposition kickouts by having a ball winning midfield will help the whole team to function better. I believe a lot of the defensive problems in recent years stem from consistently losing out in the kickout battle against better midfields.

Niall Kelly is playing great football and is taking on a lot of the leadership in the forwards which is good to see. Cathal McNally is also in a good vein of form. Adam Tyrrell kicked a fine point in the first half but he was quiet enough after that. I wonder did that bad free he missed at the start of the second half affect his confidence? Neil Flynn showed well for a rookie although I get the impression we won't see the best of him until the ground hardens up. He'll have a busy schedule with the u21s playing next month. There could be a chance for Eanna O'Connor to stake a claim.

Our defending over the last two Sundays was decent albeit the opposition weren't up to much. Westmeath were heavily reliant on Heslin's frees while Offaly looked quite light in the forwards and Niall McNamee doesn't look the player he was a number of years ago. I thought David Hyland had his measure today.

On a point of not closing the game out, did anyone else have the 'fear'?
That feeling which came over me last year for Down; and Tyrone the year before. For a minute or two I feared the worst again. However thankfully our lads were composed and got a score or two to eventually see it out.

We all would have liked a no mercy attitude, but I feel that will come. Each game should be used to improve on the previous games' performance, and there were elements which indicate potential.
Most have already been said - the return of Feely and Dan Flynns performance. Nialler seems to be a leader up front, however I feel we are lacking something in the forwards - based on today's starting team. Leper is not up to it. I hate to say it and he has given great service but his best days have come and gone. McNally for me is not a starting forward. Definitely a man to bring in but not a marquee forward like Niall Kelly. Neil Flynn will grow in confidence. Id give Sherry a chance the next day. This team will change again - if 21s go well Id say we might see a few entering the panel. Exciting times ahead. Keep her lit...............

Rex wrote:

jj wrote:

Was Ollie about to be taken off anyway prior to mistake ? I hope so. Otherwise, are management going to take off every player who makes an error ? If so, we'll have gone through our bench after 5 minutes

No idea but sometimes a manager needs to make a point about what he expects of a player. Making a blind reverse pass in the last couple of minutes 35 metres from goal when you are under a bit of pressure is not the thing to do. 

This is not the weak Jason Ryan in charge now. O 'Neill looks like he has a mean streak which is no harm as I think a few players have been phoning it in over the last two years. I don't think he'll entertain that.

Absolutely agree. Even if he was about to be subbed anyway O'Neill made it clear in no uncertain terms that Ollie had fucked up big time. That's the mentality we need. Well done.

JohnnyC wrote:

Good to get the win and although we got sloppy, I never thought Offaly were good enough to come back. Great display by Kevin Feely and I thought Fergal Conway, Dan Flynn and Niall Kelly were good as well. I think the substitution of Ollie was planned before he made that pass. Powderley was stripped and ready to come on.

Although I'm a fan of kick-passing, I'm not really sure we have the inside forwards to play that style at the moment. Time and again the ball was kicked into Neil Flynn and Leper and mostly they didn't win it or, if they did, they were isolated in the corner and the move fizzled out. I think at times if the likes of Dan Flynn or Paul Cribbin ran at the Offaly defence, we could have got scores far easier.

In fairness to Leper he won an awful amount of dirty ball out in front of his man and gave a peach of a pass for the goal. Still think we're searching for a true FF though.

On a side note it was good to see a healthy crowd there today. But on a negative note €3 for that match programme was a but steep. It contained a welcome from Ger, one article by Tommy Callaghan, the line ups and after that adverts. Westmeath only charged €2 last week and it had more content.
Rant over

Crofter wrote:

On a side note it was good to see a healthy crowd there today. But on a negative note €3 for that match programme was a but steep. It contained a welcome from Ger, one article by Tommy Callaghan, the line ups and after that adverts. Westmeath only charged €2 last week and it had more content.
Rant over

Actually as well on the programmes, I wonder why there aren't young lads going around selling them anymore? There was such a long queue at the little shed thing it took a good five minutes to get one.

With the long queues for the match tickets outside if the lads were selling them out there like they used to be, it'd save people time and the girls selling them inside wouldn't be under so much pressure.

The reason they don't have young lads selling programmes anymore is because they have to pay a young lad to do that job.

HauntedGraffiti wrote:

Yeah I would agree with that - if you have a speed merchant or a tricky customer, Ollie is your man. But he can struggle against the more physical operators.

When has he struggeld with more physical operators? He hardly ever concedes a score. Two game so far this year and two forwards taken off at half time. The lad is our best defender.

What looeseness is there to his play Haunted is it the fact that he was our highest scoring defender from corner back last year? Maybe i'm biased cos im a fellow clubman

The huge plus for me so far this year (2 games into the league) is Feely. I didn't think he would make any impact on the team this year having being away from the game for a few years but that was some game he played yesterday. Yes he gave away a few sloppy passes but over all a great start for him.

Westside wrote:

HauntedGraffiti wrote:

Yeah I would agree with that - if you have a speed merchant or a tricky customer, Ollie is your man. But he can struggle against the more physical operators.

When has he struggeld with more physical operators? He hardly ever concedes a score. Two game so far this year and two forwards taken off at half time. The lad is our best defender.  

What looeseness is there to his play Haunted is it the fact that he was our highest scoring defender from corner back last year? Maybe i'm biased cos im a fellow clubman

What looseness in his play?

Did you see that incident yesterday?!

I think he's a superb footballer by the way, I just prefer him at half back. Think his attacking potential is better utilised there as well.

A deserved win and lot's of positives as other's have mentioned.
Not sure what's going on at half time, but the 2nd half again was poor. . And if we take out cathal goal. It was 4 Neil Flynn frees, no point from play isn't good enough, and certainly wouldn't be good enough against better opposition.

I know I come across negative and I really don't want to but I really think we have gone back years. Like here we are sitting in Division 3 after beaten Offaly by 4 points and we are clinging to a few positives which is fair enough I suppose. We have to analyse games.

Jason Ryan got serious flack and still gets it but what has changed?ok a few young players have been brought in which happens every year some will make it some won't. But is there any real change in out style of play. Have we improved our defence? I know it's early but I just see a team that just goes out and plays and because we're in division 3 we'll get away with it. I'll say it again because I know it comes across as very negative, I really don't want to be but i haven't I'm seen any improvements tacticly. I'm just throwing it out there.

Positives so far:
Kevin Feely and Dan Flynn are back. I think this is a great stroke of luck for Cian O'Neill and the 2 lads look as if they could be great additions for us this year. Great to see Peter Kelly injury free as well.
Niall Kelly has been excellent so far and is showing leadership in the forwards.
A more kick-passing style. I'll put this down as a positive as I think it's the right way to go but I'm not sure if we currently have the inside forwards to pull it off.
Better defending. Early days yet but I think there is a bit more bite about our defending so far this year. And the forwards seem to be tackling more which takes the pressure off the defenders. A big caveat though is playing against Division 3 teams is unlikely to expose the weaknesses that are presumably still there.
New players. Apart from Feely and Dan Flynn, Cian O'Donoghue has been impressive. Neil Flynn showed signs of improvement yesterday. The jury is still out on a few players like Adam Tyrell.
The crowds seem to be back. Good to see a big crowd following us the last couple of weeks after a noticeable dip over the last couple of years.

Negatives:
We're still fading out in games. Luckily the teams in Division 3 haven't been able to capatalise but it's a big worry. This problem certainly predates Cian O'Neill but he was talking about trying to address it after the match yesterday.
Free-taking. Neil Flynn found his range towards the end yesterday but our free-taking hasn't been great in both games so far.
Wasted possession. We owned the ball for most of the match yesterday so 1-12 wasn't a great return even though conditions were poor. I think our kicking style needs a bit of refinement. Worth sticking to though.

On the kicking game, it is a lot harder to implement that style this time of year when the ball is wet, the wind is howling and there is six inches of wet grass giving uneven bounce. Much easier to play on Croke Park's pitch in the summer.

After the last couple of years and the influx of new young players it was always going to be about building it up as we go. We were at such a low ebb that I think Cian has done an excellent job do far. We needed to get out of Div 3, we are well on our way with a brand new team. I'm happy with that for the time being.

Three weeks more training to iron out a few more flaws.

It would be hard to overstate what a low base we're starting from.

The Dublin and Kerry games last year were the most shocking performances I've seen from Kildare in 25 years of watching them - and believe me, it's a competitive list. The Kerry game was so bad that in the aftermath, Jim McGuinness devoted an entire Irish Times column to it, suggesting that it represented a crisis in Gaelic football! Just to add to the fun, we've had two successive relegations.

O'Neill is adapting the tactical approach with a young team. But we're top of the table and on target for promotion after two games, with three weeks to put more work in. There are more players to be introduced. We're doing alright.

Div 3 outright. . Kildare 3/10.

Bookies are rarely wrong. . Here's hoping.

Any word on Alan smith folks ?. Might be our solution to the FF spot.