When you hear Galway people saying they expect a better test against Westmeath next week,well that says it all.

ziggy320001 (Meath) - Posts: 2432 - 01/02/2015 20:56:32    1688951

Apart from GK Meath do not have one decent line throughout team. Wallace and McMahon back to the U21s to let them develop. Playing so many average young lads not doing them any favours for their future careers.
Kildare now a must win game, serious concerns for Meath football. On recent showings, not even close to Division one standard.

seadog54 (Meath) - Posts: 2144 - 01/02/2015 20:59:23    1688953

oldsam_newsam

totally agree with your second paragraph there, almost like these guys are immune to any criticism and i cant get my head around why theyre playing ahead of proven players in meath like d.bray, queeney, even cian ward too. Im all for developing young talent but they have to be a bit more bulked up physically before we start playing them in important league/championship games.

redser123 (Meath) - Posts: 402 - 01/02/2015 21:05:03    1688959

Why is there no balance on the Meath forum ?

When you win, You are great and everything is falling into place perfectly. The young players are fantastic and they are complimented by some decent "old heads" with experience. And there is no doubt that you feel you can compete against Dublin in Leinster and even look beyond that to possible all ireland quarter finals etc (Okay, maybe a slight exaggeration, but you catch me drift)

Then when you lose (in the first round of the league mind), Its not a case of, we have 6 games left and promotion is still possible, Instead you completely flip and say the young players arent good enough and the "old heads" with experience are just not cutting it at this level no more. Relegation is a near certainty and you have no chance of competing against the best sides for the next 10 or 15 years (Okay, AGAIN maybe a slight exaggeration, but you catch me drift)

Your support base (based on this forum) drifts from one extreame to the other. You get overly-disappointed when you lose a round 1 league game, And yet if you won today you would be telling each other that promotion is just around the corner and this meath team are on the way up..

Is there no sensible people who will meet the devastation after defeat, and the ridiculous enthusiasm after a win.... in the middle and just say - Its one league game, It wasnt good enough today but the season is only beginning and this team can/will improve. Its not the be all and end all today. Jesus anyone would think it was.

Get over it. Wait until next saturday if you beat Kildare, Jaysus the world will be such a lovely place again for Meath fans and an all ireland win will surely just be around the corner.

waynoI (Dublin) - Posts: 13650 - 01/02/2015 21:16:59    1688969

must say near as bad performance iv ever seen from a meath team.
3 players i cant complain about.
Donal Keogan: Hungry as always put his body on the line always and great great defender.
Andy tormley: had quiet game but at least he was hungry and tried run at galway. was never a black card galway man played it up.
paddy o rourke: how many games is it now we are hoping paddy to make a save and keep meath in games its getting a joke.

g. reilly was back his lazy ways. stephen bray was afraid to shoot. and mickey newman was poor.

Meath football need to clear out the players who arent playing for the jersey. Meath football is not indivuals it never was it is playing as one and meath are years of competing with that team.
If we lose against kildare saturday we are facing big trouble.
And yet again meath will get to leinster final lose to dubs and lose out in round 4 qualifier. people say its a ok year got a leinster final.
who have we played to get there nobody come up against a good team and meath crumble no hunger
disgrace to the jersey and county

MeathOnHill16 (Meath) - Posts: 226 - 01/02/2015 21:18:11    1688971

Yes it is hard to even try to be positive. Kildare match will help to build or bust once and for all.

nobull456 (Meath) - Posts: 1224 - 01/02/2015 21:37:34    1688982

wayno

I think the problem is,that it would seem that none of the problems have been rectified in any shape or form..

ziggy320001 (Meath) - Posts: 2432 - 01/02/2015 21:44:09    1688987

Very disappointing today. It's no wonder Micko apologised afterwards. No bottle, No game plan, running round like kids, poor tactics. All adds up to a bad day at the office. Cant be any worse or can we?

Diego (Meath) - Posts: 1205 - 01/02/2015 21:58:22    1688997

Just to give a galway view, when the score was 1- 9 to 0- 09 Meath missed a great goal chance and it had a major bearing on the outcome, I think it was Newman half way thru the second half

steelydan (Galway) - Posts: 141 - 01/02/2015 22:00:31    1688999

aLL the yap about MOD, and players have no pride in jersey!!.. how many of you armchair footballers played intercounty??..I Have, and it bull when people say players dont have pride in their jersey, you give it everything.

Ever realise that just maybe we dont have enough talented players at the moment,it happens to every county, and i notice, Meath play a good game and win, and we have certain critics here talking All Irelands, then we lose, and they blame everyone including the parish priest, and telling the forum we are a disgrace..

Some need to wise up, except the fact that we aint as strong as previous teams, and try to rectify it, starting at underage structures!

sob (Meath) - Posts: 492 - 02/02/2015 08:13:12    1689004

So Sob if no one played Intercounty football they have no say or no opinion? Get down off that high horse off yours.

OLLIE (Louth) - Posts: 12224 - 02/02/2015 08:26:13    1689009

Ollie absolutely correct. For what its worth i did (ok at senior it was only obyrne) but that's years and years ago.
I take the opinions of those who travelled that distance and back and who were treated to that display,. I am not giving up on the goal which is
Promotion, win on Saturday and its still very possible. Sob i think what you are missing is we are better for the sum of our parts than we are playing as a team, Donegal are the opposite, and no in not saying we could win all ire, but my god we are better than that display.

royaldunne (Meath) - Posts: 19449 - 02/02/2015 09:00:46    1689018

Royal, i agree, my point was simple, folk here polk cheapshots at players trying to do their best, they dont set out to play bad, no one those, yet on the forum down through the years, we have the cheapshot brigade, willing to fire shots when Meath do bad, but when meath play well, they talk All Irelands, we need to be realistic, yesterday was drab, a long drive home with a car full of silence,but one thing we agreed was we just dont have enough talented players to compete at the top,plain and simple.

sob (Meath) - Posts: 492 - 02/02/2015 09:13:57    1689021

Consistently inconsistent.

sob (Meath) - Posts: 492 - 02/02/2015 09:23:07    1689024

Lads we just dont have the players. MOD tried loads of players during the O Byrne and none of those played yesterday. Will stay up but at best we are a top 15 team.

Forglory (Meath) - Posts: 85 - 02/02/2015 09:52:12    1689038

Some comments:

Why is Donncha Tobin playing corner back? Hes the closest thing we have to an all-rounder like Paul Flynn. Do Dublin play Paul Flynn at corner back?

Where are Cian Ward, Peadar Byrne, Niall McLoughlin, Ciaran Lenehan, Alan Forde? Don't tell me they are too old. Otherwise you can tell me that Bernard Brogan, Alan Brogan, Colm Cooper, half the Donegal team etc are too old.

Why is Stephen Bray playing in the half-forwards? He should be wrapped up in a box of cotton wool until the hard ground of croke park in June. Not playing in the half forward line on the 1 February.

What has happened to Michael Newman? Since he is a without doubt an excellent footballer but one who is not as able to win his own ball as a top intercounty full-foward should be, would it not make sense to put him at centre-forward?

What has Joey Wallace done to deserve his place on the Meath team? Hes got potential for sure but could they not let the lad finish growing first before bringing him into intercounty football? Ditto McMahon who was taken off in two championship games last year after being physically dominated. Both good footballers in fairness to them but surely you need to do more to get a Meath jersey at senior level?

But there is no point in us talking about Meath beating likes of Dublin and Kerry and Donegal when we have individuals on the panel who do not have the same lifestyle and focus as the very best panels in the country. IMO we would be better off having 30 lads, not all of great ability, who are obsessed with getting most out of themselves in quest for winning. Thats what Donegal have. And Dublin too (except they have so much talent to match).

Crinigan (Meath) - Posts: 1319 - 02/02/2015 09:53:18    1689039

I don't agree with a lot of the comments here. Fact is our shooting is shocking. We had a lot of chances in the match and many easy points kicked wide. How many good long passes were made into Newman or Bray that ended with no score? Nearly every time Galway got the ball to their inside forwards it ended over the bar. Newman and Bray in particular had some terrible wides. I don't agree that the team didn't make an effort or have pride in their jersey because they did. The reality is for this level our finishing was muck.

Newman is one of our best forwards and look at the misses he had. Bray as usual kicked more wides than he did points. And when we were only 3 points behind mid way though the second half Newman was one on one and blazed it over the bar. Joey wallace panicked in anther attacked and hit a terrible effort. If he got the same time and space with his club he wouldn't have made the same mistake. No composure in front of goal. Galway go down the other end and kick 2 points and a goal. Our inability to kick scores consistently will be the difference between us getting promoted and relegated.

Look at the Dublin game. The dubs took most of the few chances they had in the second half and we only kicked about half of ours. Even though we got back level we had a number of chances to take the lead but typical to our matches in recent years we squandered them and the more clinical dubs went up the other end and took their 2 chances.

The overall performance wasn't too bad but we will continue to have the worst away record in the top 3 divisions over the last 10 years unless we start taking our chances. It's make or break against Kildare now, who threw away a win against Down. Very early in the season to be saying it but this team needs some momentum ASAP before the wheels come off and the inevitable pressure from the media and supporters alike.

Jack_Goff (Meath) - Posts: 2920 - 02/02/2015 10:13:17    1689052

Royaldunne- what are you on about 'Donegal have the opposite ? '. Donegal had a good managers but it would not have been possible without serious players.

TheRightStuff (Donegal) - Posts: 1688 - 02/02/2015 10:13:29    1689053

Sob
You are right not enough top players at the moment to compete at top level and I don't doubt that every person involved in the set up give their lives to succeed but still very disappointing performance yesterday.It seems that we have no game plan but I'm sure at this level there has to be even if it's not obvious.At the same time let the league settle down for a couple of rounds and then we'll have a much better idea of where we really stand.I was on here last year about underage structures and still no change and until we manage to change this our long term outlook is not going to improve.

runnerin (Meath) - Posts: 202 - 02/02/2015 10:13:58    1689056

Disappointed but not surprised, team appeared dis-jointed, game plan or system (whatever you want to call it) was missing i.e. players didn't seem to know what to do when they had the ball, and no defensive organisation when they didn't. Galway were much more clued in, knew how they wanted to play and were able to dominate far too easily when they got on top.
People should calm down a bit though, early days and all to play for. If I was to take anything from yesterday, it's that a serious look at player selection, and where they play is required. I believe we have the players to make a decent team. MOD and crew are very much in the final rounds of their tenure if they can't get at a minimum a consistency of performance worthy of the jersey.

moylagh (Meath) - Posts: 484 - 02/02/2015 10:15:26    1689059