Senior championship 2018

Rufus T Firefly

Rufus T Firefly

Well-Known Member
bcb1 said:
@Rufus T Firefly good to see you on Saturday and hard luck with the minor match.
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Thanks my friend - always good to get a chat, no matter how brief.

Congratulations on the Minor title. I thought our lads made a great game of it but that Rangers were just that wee bit more incisive. Both goalkeepers played well, and both made excellent saves, but for us - as the vanquished - those chances will go down as the 'what if' variety!
 
M

MrMaguire2002

Well-Known Member
Cross were excellent yesterday but certainly the ref played into their hands in the first half. Cullyhanna looked to be really cutting Cross open at will in the first 15 mins. McQuillan looked dangerous. However, after that Cross just destroyed them. A 5 point defeat flatters Cullyhanna.

Aaron Kernan, Hughes and Hanratty all did well but Rian O'Neill take a bow. His point from the sideline was something only the very top players can produce. He's not merely a top prospect he's already a top player. The first point he scored was also a terrific score and the 2nd and third points for Carragher (and McKeever I think) all came through him. He was arguably the best player on the pitch against Maghery last year at 19 years of age and stood out yesterday (even added in a goal line clearance!) at 20 years of age.

Armagh need to be starting him this year there is no doubt about that.

Oisin got hurt early on. Hope the injury isn't too bad. AK had so much time on the ball it was ridiculous.
 
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pablo

pablo

Well-Known Member
Rufus T Firefly said:
Managed to get to all the games over the course of the weekend and there was plenty to discuss arising from the action.

The Maghery and Nab match was quite poor fare to be honest, with neither side really deserving the victory. Both sides seemed to have mini periods of dominance, and I felt each looked as if they would go on to victory, but they failed to make their dominance count on the scoreboard. A case in point was Maghery, who I felt dominated either side of half time but could not put the Nab away. The match was therefore close throughout, and there was a feeling that whoever got the first goal was going to go through. The goal of course came for the Nab, and it was somehow in keeping with the contest that an attempt for a point fell short and was fisted to the net. It looked all up for Maghery at that stage but they rallied and I felt maybe were guilty of going for goals too early, when points might still have brought them level.

This was a game when many of the Nab's top players simply did not perform, although they won't mind that as the result is everything. For Maghery, I felt their challenge was fatally undermined by their absentees and even Cusack who played did not look fully fit to me.
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Two very different games to be sure. Friday nights match was very flat, error ridden and best described by somebody sitting close by as 'awful futtery'. Also bit surprised at the lack of atmosphere among the crowd in the AG that night. Maghery tend to flatter to deceive; they looked the team with the more well defined game plan and structure, but could not make it count on the scoreboard and even before the actual event occurred, there was the always the feeling that they had not enough up front to recover from a sucker punch goal. Which is exactly what happened.
Second semi final was a very different beast and of excellent standard-particularly the first half in spite of the ref. Would agree Armagh County side should be in a better place based on that game
 
G

green flag

Active Member
Congratulations to Rangers, even though they knocked me out of the sweepstàke, this was a top class display of Gaelic football as it should be played, one could see Donal Murtaghs no nonsense approach imprinted all over this team, looks like they have the foundations for another long run at the top.
 
Big Jim

Big Jim

Well-Known Member
ragingbull said:
St Vincents lost in Dublin & St Brigids lost in Roscommon,it's Crossmaglen year
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Funny you say that, I was talking to a few guys from Monaghan yesterday and we chatted about the chances of Cross winning Ulster (ok @bcb1 take a breath, I know you have to win Armagh first and some results in other counties have gone against the favourites :D) I was saying I believed that this Cross team have some spark within them that only a successful bunch of lads that are hurting from a couple of high profile defeats can bring. Of course I was "wrong" and it was Kilcoo's year as they're really special. Not special enough it seems. I still believe that cross will be hard to stop in Ulster. Was that my opinion before the quarter final stages? No it wasn't, but last week I saw a hunger. A hunger that hasn't been as evident in the last few years.

Sadly this means that the county team will be robbed of the chance to have some serious talent lacking for the early part of the season at least. That of course assuming that the best will want to, or be available to join. Regardless of outside issues, if they do exist, we need players with serious guts and physical presence to add to the talent that is already there. After last week, if someone can convince Johnny H that the county team isn't an alien thing and would be greatly enhanced with his ability, then I'd say sign him up now. Just keep him off Twattering! Bloody Umpa Lumpa Trumpa is hard enough to ignore. Jeez he must have been good if I changed my mind and want him back. Stuff the dissenters. If he's part of the best squad, so be it - guaranteed after his first session of being a bollox I'll be calling for his head, but sure I'm that fickle! Anyways, that's for a few weeks time!!

Good luck to Ballymacnab and Crossmaglen next Sunday!
 
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