Allianz NFL Div 2 Fixtures and Results 2011 - Official Thread

derry 0-13 kildare 0-11 a poor game . should have won that with jd missing three frees some bad wides as well .the deicion making was bad at times PON had a stromer at midfield again . see kildare are playing the blanket defence system used by armagh and troyne, mc griilen had some nice runs along wing to set up a couple of points

Disappointing match today. I thought the ref was bad but we didn't play well anyway. They didn't make the most of having the wind in the first half, there was too much hand passing going on. Lynch and Dowling both did well I thought and McGrillen and Cribbin tried hard. It's going to be tough against Donegal next week.

Poor fair today. No fluency or pattern of play stood out, has the training been steeped up as they looked sluggish?
Starting Flanagan in the half forwards was very strange considering Roli and Jimmers were on the bench. I hope they are not going back to a defensive system as I think the best performances we have had have been playing attacking football.

One bright spot on a dark day was Dowling, he didn't have the same impact in the second half but for an 18 year old he was a joy to behold in the first. Scored a couple of cracking points, with the one off his left foot being quite fantastic.

Now, J.D what has happened to your free taking, yes it was not an easy day but three easy ones missed in the second half put the kibosh on any recovery. Maybe it should have been passed to someone else or take them off the ground. this is not a one off and maybe it should be looked at.

Derry for their part were very clinical and deserved their win. They played well, moved the ball far quicker than us and had a decent game plan.

Donegal next week is now huge if promotion is to be had. I'm not panicking as it's February and a lot of lads are to come in (where was Rob Kelly today) and every team has an off day. Maybe the loss will give them a kick up the arse. However going on todays performance and you are only ever as good as your last one we will be spending another year in div 2.

Best for us today were Dowling, McGrillen and O'Neill.

Bad result today. We missed out on a couple of frees that could have won the game. The ref wasn't great. Mid field (paudie and lynch) seemed to work well and cribben fought hard for the ball. Next game will be tough but it is a vital game that we need to win.

[PON had a stromer at midfield again] maybe the spelling was intentional...

Maybe I was watching a different game but other than the first 15 mins we go cleaned at midfield. Holly was outstanding for Derry.
Have to agree with Rex, Dowlings point from under the stand was unreal if Gooch done it they wud be raving,left a few short in the 2nd half.We never made a goal chance Derry could have had 2 in the first five mins.
Pity Kelly didnt make it was looking forward to seeing him. Anyone else worried about Smithys form at the minute scored a nice point near the end but missed a few balls he wud usually win..
BTW was he booked for diving the ref wasnt gonna give him any frees was he

Agree with a lot of Rex's comments. Very strange starting Flano in the forwards. He did much better in the second half at wing back.

Heard Rob Kelly has a hamstring problem

see kildare are playing the blanket defence system used by armagh and troyne,
Armagh and Tyrone did not use the same systems
Armagh did a total blanket defence
Tyrone defended and attacked in numbers which is why they were so successful compared to Armagh

Think midfield was a big concern for us today. O'Neill and Lynch are both excellent players on the ball but we don't have a ball winner in the shape of Earley or Flynn in there.

Flanagan in the forwards while Whyte and Callaghan were in the backs was strange to say the least.

Smith's form definitely is a worry, he was quiet in Belfast and wasn't really involved today other than that very bad habit he has now of looking for a free at every opportunity. Needs to concentrate on playing his game rather than going down looking for frees all the time.

It was was more worrying though how much we struggled to break derry down when they put men behind the ball. Some of the passing into the forwards was terrible.

Still, it might dampen expectations a little. We were always going to lose at some stage this year, the key to success is how we bounce back

It was a poor performance and Derry weren't much better. It's still a game we could, and probably should, have won with a few points to spare. No point in getting too worked up about it. It's only February and Derry are traditionally a team that does well at this time of year. The tight confines of Newbridge probably don't really suit our style of play either.

We have problems at midfield but hopefully Flynn will solve that when he returns.

Could Dowling kick the frees from the right hand side? Johnny kicked a few bad ones today with his left foot.

forget about the refs lads. they are what they are and the more we go on about them the harder it becomes to build this bridge to get over them. every county has their gripes but dont think persistent complaining will resolve it. at the end of the day there were 3 frees awarded to us and we kicked the 3 of them wide. 2 point defeat means we had the outcome in our hands and didnt take it. cork had 1 chance wit the last kick of the game v's kerry in rd one of the league and the chap banged it over from over 45 yards out. thats the difference in winning and losing. not refs.

lastline wrote:

forget about the refs lads. they are what they are and the more we go on about them the harder it becomes to build this bridge to get over them. every county has their gripes but dont think persistent complaining will resolve it. at the end of the day there were 3 frees awarded to us and we kicked the 3 of them wide. 2 point defeat means we had the outcome in our hands and didnt take it. cork had 1 chance wit the last kick of the game v's kerry in rd one of the league and the chap banged it over from over 45 yards out. thats the difference in winning and losing. not refs.

I don't think anyone is being overly critical of the referee or using him as an excuse for Kildare's defeat. He certainly wasn't the winning and losing of the game today.

That said, there should have been at least 5 minutes of injury time in the second half. He played 2 minutes in the first half when there was barely any stoppages at all apart from the one Derry lad who picked up a blood injury.

The ref was not the reason we lost but two things annoyed me about him today.
First the amount of times a Derry man seemed to take too many steps and was let go and the second was his different approach to the Goalkeepers. Connolly seemed to get a warning for not taking his kickouts quick enough yet he let the Derry keeper was allowed take as much time as he wished.

Like I said I'm not going to get to worried about it yet. A win in Donegal will erase today and with two local derbies coming up there is much to look forward to. Lets hope the lads stand up next week. We had a poor league last year but I don't remember moaning about that last August.

Very disappointing result today. And a similar performance to match it.
I don't think there was anyone out there from 1-15 could say they put in a decent shift, nor could they say they were happy with their contribution.
It is only February after all, so we cant be overly critical. But top teams tend to not to lose home matches in the League, as in the Dublin's,Kerry's and Cork's
And i'd be pretty certain when I say that another year in Division 2 is almost a certainty.

Back to the game. When your first choice midfield pairing is unavailable, an All star corner back and other big players your obviously going to have to cut your cloth to fit.
Your going to have to be a little defensive.
Roli offers little defensively. Thats why he didnt start.
Playing defensively had nothing to do with the winning or losing of the game.
Our main problem was that we could not win primary possession around the middle.
When that happens your on the back foot straight away.
When we did win possession we gave it away cheaply, very often it was poor passing rather than Derry pressure that was our undoing.

And you cannot take anything away from Derry. They played clever football. They slowed it down on a regular basis, Kickouts took at least 30-40 seconds, prevented quick free's ect.
They crowded the middle with big men and won the midfield battle hands down.

David Whyte has had better days at the office, I didnt realise Tommy O'Neill was on the field until he was taken off at half time.
Our normal top performers were poor. Bolton, Leper, JD,Smith, all failed to show up.

Hugh Lynch simply gave away to much ball, was caught in possession and contributed little.
Is he carrying a knock, because he looked to struggle with his mobility throughout the game.
Paudie done ok from broken/open play but winning primary possession is what we need from our midfielders.

With JD was misfiring and Callaghan could just not get going it seemed to me like we lacked a little leadership on the pitch in the final 5-10 minutes.
The match was in the melting pot, and was there to be taken by the scruff of the neck we just never got grip of it when it mattered.

I think the players need to decide or ask themselves if they want to be a top team, play in the top Division and win trophies or if they are happy to Duck and dive in division 2 and get morale victories in Summer.
Thats what they need to be asking themselves this week. Because the winner of Sam and the Delaney cup will be playing Division 1 football next year.
Donegal is a must win game.

I agree with you100% Fionn. We failed to make use of the strong wind in the first half and but for poor finishing by Derry we would have been well behind by the end of the first half. Some of the Kildare wides were so bad you'd think you were watching a Division 4 match.
I thought it was a mistake to play Leper at centre back. Also the loss of Bob Kelly was huge as the two inside forwards contributed little and in fact I think Johnny got most of our scores again.
Once again Flanagan's passing let him down, one of his passes went straight to a Derry man resulting in them getting a soft point. Bolton was out of it for most of the match.
I hope the experience will bring the team down to earth and bring home to them that they must work an aweful lot harder if they want to get out of Division 2.

Cant believe JD pulled out of that ball with the keeper after smith had put him clean through. Terrible to watch.

E Flats is a brilliant free kick taker.

The ref had little to with the following:
the inability of the centrefield to catch or collect a breaking ball;
the inability of players to pass accurately;
the fact that we couldn't use the wind in the first half;
the fact that Derry could and should have scored two goals in the opening ten minutes;
the fact that free after free went hopelessly wide.
None of these can be blamed on the ref.

We seemed to be hittting every kickout to Lynch i the first 15 minutes after that Derry copped onto it and I tgink we won one kick out for the rest of the game. Im a nig fan of Paudie but i dont think he contested one kick out.

How many times over the last 12 months have we seen Johny miss easy frees from the right hand side. It nearly cost us against Antrim last year. If Geezer does not rectify this soon its going to hurt us big time.

Alan Smith really has to pull his socks up. 4 balls he should have won and he barely contested them. A yellow card for diving summed up his day. Under serious pressure from Dowling for a staring sport. Smithy is at his best when he is baring down on goal, no better man, hoepfully he will be back to his best soon.

I thought Flanagan had a good game until he made that howler of a pass, that led to a score and then two indirect scores. Terrible mistake and not good enough at this level.

Higlight of the day was Dowlings point from infront of the stand, possibly the best score I have ever seen in Newbridge.

Under serious pressure now to get promoted.

Ageed with all you said Fionnmccool, this was a big deflation after all the promising build-up and good start to the new season, this could be very damaging if not corrected, interesting to see the reaction next week, another defeat in Donegal next week and self doubt will start to come into it and with the squirrel eaters top of the tree and full of guff we cant risk losing to them in Newbridge.
Very few positives from yesterday but Fionn Dowling was definitely one of them, but I thought Smithy was slow and looked lacking in confidence and I noticed this in his other appearances for Kildare so far this year. he even got booked for diving and I saw the incident and sorry to say the decision looked correct, I was surprised both he and Mick Foley came out in the second half, Paddy Bradley gave Mick a difficult time, cant fault his effort but Mick is just a short of what is required for this level. I thought all our back line was loose and slow except for McGrillen, we should have been 2 goals down early on such was our marking at the back. Rob Kelly had a silght hamstring twinge and might have made a big difference. Johnny missed 2 close in frees with his left foot, have we no left sided free taker?, The ref took ages to talk to the umpire before booking 2 players, I knew the long wait would not suit Johnny.

Bad day at the office for most of the lads.Lynch and PON did well.Lads don,t read to much into this,as we are still trying out players in different areas.
Same as last year not great in division 2 but got to an all ireland.As i said last year and will say it again,we want this to peak in jury and august.if we do get promoted its a bonus.
Dowling was good,and dont forget smithy has is trial hanging over him..Onwards on upwards from here....

Just to put things in perspective. We still had Flats, Flynn, Earley, Chalky, Kavanagh,Rob Kelly, Peter Kelly, Fitzpatrick, Lyons, Mac, Conway, Roli, Mollick on the sideline, so I wont be pushing th panic button yet

We have no left foot free taker on the team

Agree with Chopperdalton there ,wont be pushing the panic button there.A win next sunday and we will be all singing there praises

Little unfair to be bringing personal comments about players up Carburyman

relax lads yesterday was not the best day out but the lads will learn and move on. Didnt make the most of the wind in the first half but battled right till the end. They should get rid of your man doyle missed 2 frees (oh sorry Chopper Dalton easy frees ) into a gale force wind off his weaker left foot that as far as i could see no one else wanted to take and only scored 7 points.......he has to go

Well square ball,if you had that hanging over you ,wouldn't you be thinking of it.And to be fair to Smithy he is getting on with,and also Greezer will keep faith with him,as he will come good this year,no doubt in my mind.