Maybe not the best way for Brolly to express the truth, they are two separate things what he said and how he said it. The point Brolly made was very relevant and valid.

arock (Dublin) - Posts: 4897 - 01/04/2015 08:34:59    1709247

Brolly is right, everyone knows it. Even teams winning trophies with the blanket defence know he is right. It's a disease in the game, so many teams are guilty of it but we can thank ulster for introducing it. Yeah i know, everyone from Ulster will be banging on about how the teams from other provinces are doing it but we all know where it came from.

switec (Kildare) - Posts: 525 - 01/04/2015 08:50:21    1709252

Strictly speaking Harte is right, whilst we'd all love to see a high scoring free flowing game with no cynicism, manly hits and preferably free drink in the terraces that wont keep supporters happy. As another poster made the point if a team can't adapt to out think a system maybe they are following their own system and too rigid to adapt to anything. The problem is that whilst everyone says they want teams to go toe to toe when they get hockeyed the first port of call is to blame the coach, blame the players etc.

The naivety of Dublin was questioned last year when they lost the semi and this was a team and coach that had God like status bestowed upon them from the previous year but the first sign of trouble the crowd, media and anyone thats willing to come up with a sound bite has their pound of flesh, then the exact same thing happened to Donegal in the final with people questioning the players and coach. So whilst I might not agree with the sentiment, Harte is right because coaches and teams who play lovely football and dont get results will not survive in this results oriented business and make no mistakes it is a business so teams will do what they can within their resources to be successful, not to be liked but be successful as that is what keeps fickle supporters coming back.

So if people dont like the 'muck' which is being presented the only way the top brass will listen is if people vote with their feet and it doesn't happen. If a team get to the AI final playing rubbish football every Tom, Dick and Harry would still sell their first born to get their hands on a ticket. So unless the people in the stands do something, bed yourselves in for more of the same, and booing from the stands after you've paid your money will have no effect as the revenue is still rolling in.

duckula20 (Antrim) - Posts: 175 - 01/04/2015 08:52:33    1709253

Completely agree with Arock.
Whilst Brolly does go too far sometimes and im no fan of Harte (for me the mask slipped a long time ago with this man) there is nothing Brolly has been saying that isnt true if people are being honest - football has become, to a large extent, painful to watch

Tim_Burr (Down) - Posts: 460 - 01/04/2015 09:01:04    1709255

The irony of Brolly's argument is a few years ago he was the biggest cheerleader of this style of football on the RTE panel. I used to rate him highly as a pundit but now think he is an attention seeker picking rows with Tyrone's main men and Kerry's also.

seanie08 (Monaghan) - Posts: 1799 - 01/04/2015 09:07:31    1709259

Greengrass
County: Louth
Posts: 3597

1709236
Richieq the last four seasons have been muck ? Last year did you happen to see Gslway v Kerry, Armagh v Donegal, Mayo v Cork , Donegal v Dublin or Kerry v Mayo (twice) . All if those games took place in the All Ireland series . You have done gall to say the football was muck .

Of those games you mention the only ones that displayed any quality was Kerry v Mayo twice and Donegal v Dublin, the rest you quite were average at best and if you think highlighting 6 matches out of an entire football championship season proves it had quality then you are a long way off proving your point. Take the entire Leinster Championship, Mayo v Roscommon, Armagh v Cavan and practically all the Ulster Championship, Cork v Kerry, Monaghan v Dublin, Meath v Armagh, you have some gall to say football isn't muck after enduring those games

Richieq (Meath) - Posts: 3734 - 01/04/2015 10:14:24    1709283

mayotyroneman
County: Tyrone
Posts: 1284

1709151
this guy is a complete clown and should not be afforded even publicity on this forum....off course mickey harte is not in the business of entertainment,,,and of course brolly only has a blinkered view of what is entertaining...i don't want to watch a game where teams knock the ball over the bar for fun...good teams can break down defensive tactics..kerry last year against donegal, tyrone against armagh in 2005, mayo against tyrone in 2013, mayo against dublin in 2012, dublin against kerry in 2011, etc etc...brolly lost the plot a long time ago...pathetic

So, is a soccer scores you want? 2-1 maybe?

Joe_Bloggs (Tipperary) - Posts: 186 - 01/04/2015 10:23:39    1709288

Richie you are way off the Mark. You really are the epitome of the footballing snob . This drivel about "quality" is just that, drivel. The paying customers left happy after all of those games . You can take your snobbish nonsense about "quality" and park it. It is as pathetic as your response to "defensive" Monaghan tanking Meath was. Those six games were all in the All-Ireland series and as such they are the peak of our sports season. That series was as good as I have seen in a long time and I go back further than you do. Of course we have poor games and more significantly mismatches . We have had those since I started watching football . Every sport has them . Leinster is a basket case at the moment because Dublin are miles ahead of the rest in terms of players, population , financial resources and playing all their games in Croker . Try going back to the seventies and eighties when two teams dominated and everything else was irrelevant . Try going to semi finals when teams were stuffed by fifteen points in front of twenty thousand people in a ramshackle stadium. You talk about Cork v Kerry . Do you not remember Kerry tanking Cork every time they played them in Croker right through the noughties including the final in 09. Your viewpoint is blinkered . If you can't acknowledge that we had a very good All Ireland series last year then talking to you is a complete waste of time . Maybe we should go back to the late eighties when a deeply cynical outfit put two All Irelands back to back . But sure they were the best of times weren't they ?

Greengrass (Louth) - Posts: 6031 - 01/04/2015 11:08:10    1709319

The problem with what Brolly has said is that some people only see the expletives. Had he not said the F word he would have got more backing and rightly so but you can't be telling anyone let alone a respected GAA person like Mickey Harte to F off. Very poor from a Barrister!

Tir Conaill Abu (Donegal) - Posts: 1671 - 01/04/2015 11:12:34    1709323

Fair point Tir Conaill. Message lost in the delivery.

Greengrass (Louth) - Posts: 6031 - 01/04/2015 11:39:00    1709342

Richie you are way off the Mark. You really are the epitome of the footballing snob . This drivel about "quality" is just that, drivel. The paying customers left happy after all of those games . You can take your snobbish nonsense about "quality" and park it. It is as pathetic as your response to "defensive" Monaghan tanking Meath was. Those six games were all in the All-Ireland series and as such they are the peak of our sports season. That series was as good as I have seen in a long time and I go back further than you do. Of course we have poor games and more significantly mismatches . We have had those since I started watching football . Every sport has them . Leinster is a basket case at the moment because Dublin are miles ahead of the rest in terms of players, population , financial resources and playing all their games in Croker . Try going back to the seventies and eighties when two teams dominated and everything else was irrelevant . Try going to semi finals when teams were stuffed by fifteen points in front of twenty thousand people in a ramshackle stadium. You talk about Cork v Kerry . Do you not remember Kerry tanking Cork every time they played them in Croker right through the noughties including the final in 09. Your viewpoint is blinkered . If you can't acknowledge that we had a very good All Ireland series last year then talking to you is a complete waste of time . Maybe we should go back to the late eighties when a deeply cynical outfit put two All Irelands back to back . But sure they were the best of times wer

Your last two lines prove your blinkered view, I disagree with you and so do most pundits/analists when it came to last years Champonship but I see little point in engaging any further given your obvious issues regarding Meath, time to let go like a good man. I've been called many's a thing over the years but a snob, particularly a football snob, is not one of them. If my thoughts are how you define a footballing snob then you can include two thirds of the country in that bracket, trying to defend last year as quality is simply not right, so we will leave it there so.

Richieq (Meath) - Posts: 3734 - 01/04/2015 11:50:08    1709352

We are gone to the stage now that teams are under huge pressure from supporters , sponsors etc to get results that they will play any way at all just to get a win. We are more likely to see a good game of football in division 3 or 4 than in the other two. Id have far more respect for a team that tries to go out and play football even if they got hammered than a team that puts 14 in defence and scores 4 points and still gets beaten.

ke40 (Kildare) - Posts: 209 - 01/04/2015 11:55:29    1709355

Greengrass
County: Louth
Posts: 3600
_____________________
An epic comment from a man who knows his football well done sir. It would appear that there is a fairly large proportion of Gaels who would happily have us back to the 'glory' days of the GAA and return it to an exclusive club of two or three successful counties rather than the most equitable spread we have ever seen in the past 20 years with 10 or so different winners in that period.

brendtheredhand (Tyrone) - Posts: 10897 - 01/04/2015 12:05:38    1709360

ke40
County: Kildare
Posts: 25

Id have far more respect for a team that tries to go out and play football even if they got hammered than a team that puts 14 in defence and scores 4 points and still gets beaten.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Totally agree. The worst of it was that, when interviewed after the match, McIvor actually seemed quite satisfied with how his team had done, like it was some sort of achievement. He should have been embarrassed, not of the players, but with his own spiritless tactics in a must-win match.

Thomas Clarke (Tyrone) - Posts: 1002 - 01/04/2015 12:06:58    1709366

Whatever happened to "Right lads. All the pressure is on them. Just go out and give it a lash. Do yourselves proud. Ye've nothing to lose."
Nowadays it probably goes more like this "Right lads. Get behind the ball. If we can knick a point or 2 great. But I'll be damned if we leave here losing by more than 4 points."
Point being - where once there was a dream of winning now there is a fear of losing.
I know.. I'm a hopeless romantic :)

Plasticman (Dublin) - Posts: 26 - 01/04/2015 12:14:11    1709369

Ok then lads..Lets all just watch this years football championship with some of these teams playing 14 men behind the ball..Then lets see the TV ratings go through the floor and see how long SKY or any other channel will want to promote this game of rubbish...Sooner or later if this keeps going on the TV companies will not want to show this..Simple..

Bigdong (UK) - Posts: 66 - 01/04/2015 12:26:54    1709374

sensationalist rubbish from the one and only Mr Joe Brolly. If you look at the thread on attendances there seems to be no ill impact on match goers. This man is a headline grabber. Donegal couldn't do no wrong in his eyes when they were the biggest culprits of this. I would like to see Brolly manage the Derry team next year and see how he gets on, its easier to sit in the arm chair and complain about these things.

I also hate how he always refers to these players who wish to remain anonymous. Id say half of the country is ringing him up filling Joe fully of s**** just to wind him up.

Kerry people, did you care that your team won the AI ugly last year. I think not.

As for telling people to F*** Off well that's just plain rude. Why don't you just take up Tennis Joe.

muckla (UK) - Posts: 366 - 01/04/2015 12:30:06    1709377

Richie you are not prepared to debate because you can't . Nothing to do with issues with that particular Meath team that's just the way they were . Last years All Ireland series was very good . Give me a year that you believe we had a really good All Ireland series . Otherwise off you trot in to the distance . Good man Brendan .

Greengrass (Louth) - Posts: 6031 - 01/04/2015 12:30:18    1709378

brendtheredhand
County: Tyrone
Posts: 10092

1709360
Greengrass
County: Louth
Posts: 3600
_____________________
An epic comment from a man who knows his football well done sir. It would appear that there is a fairly large proportion of Gaels who would happily have us back to the 'glory' days of the GAA and return it to an exclusive club of two or three successful counties rather than the most equitable spread we have ever seen in the past 20 years with 10 or so different winners in that period.

No that's not what we want, we want to see good football and that's all. During the 90's we had the best spread of all in terms of All Irelands with Cork, Down, Derry, Donegal Dublin, Meath, Kerry & Galway all winning titles and the likes of Clare, Leitrim, Kildare & Offaly winning provincial titles but we saw good football, at times great football so we have had an equitable spread whilst witnessing good football, nowadays we have potentially 4 of 5 winners of the All Ireland and were watching crap, the difference between the 90's and today is seismic and even some of your county brethren recognise that

Richieq (Meath) - Posts: 3734 - 01/04/2015 12:38:26    1709386

In fairness to Mickey

He did go more offensive during the league last year and Tyrone shipped some heavy scores against them

Tyrone produced some outstanding players under his tenure and they played great stuff under him...

That entertained people... it wasn't all blanket- they had outstanding players that were a joy to watch

So again... it entertained... of course it did

Now...

I think what Joe said was actually fair enough on this occasion

People getting outraged by curse words.. what decade are you living in... seriously

The way he phrased it was how a lot of people would truly feel on the topic...

Mickey has taken a sort of ultra conservative approach recently... I think he's almost too close to all of this

Saying that its not about entertainment.. of course it is.

That's why we get 80,000 into CP.. people go there in order to not sit at home and stare at the walls all day

They go there to be entertained... it's called Sports Entertainment Mickey..it's kind of a big thing right across the globe... go look it up

I think Joe and Mickey have an awful lot on common

Both these men hold very strong opinions and they are not afraid to share them...

Mickey has never been shy to give his opinion and stir the poo...

So he should expect a bit of a come back from strong willed like minded people

jimbodub (Dublin) - Posts: 20600 - 01/04/2015 13:04:54    1709407