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Leinster Football

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Replying To Greengrass:  "Unfortunately Dublin are in Leinster royaldunne so everything you said about competitiveness in Leinster is rendered null and void. Leinster is no longer a championship. There must be competitiveness for a championship to exist. When it comes to winning Leinster there is no competitiveness. The chairman of The Leinster Council can protest all he likes. The Leinster Championship is dead."
Will be interesting to see what happens when crowds are allowed to return to the games.

Leinster is dead as a competition but the farce will continue as long as people are paying money to watch.

I missed one Meath championship match since the early 80s (2003 when I was working on the Special Olympics) but was really struggling the last few years. All that was keeping me going was the fact that there had to be a "first game to miss".
The Championship going ahead in 2020 has at least removed that roadblock as picking a first game to miss was taken out of my hands, so I will happily stop wasting money and time on these games in future.

I love the league competition and will keep at that as long as I can. I'm finished with the Championship though until something changes and it wasn't hard to make my peace with that.

Greenfield (Meath) - Posts: 522 - 29/01/2021 11:32:18    2329511

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Replying To Greenfield:  "Will be interesting to see what happens when crowds are allowed to return to the games.

Leinster is dead as a competition but the farce will continue as long as people are paying money to watch.

I missed one Meath championship match since the early 80s (2003 when I was working on the Special Olympics) but was really struggling the last few years. All that was keeping me going was the fact that there had to be a "first game to miss".
The Championship going ahead in 2020 has at least removed that roadblock as picking a first game to miss was taken out of my hands, so I will happily stop wasting money and time on these games in future.

I love the league competition and will keep at that as long as I can. I'm finished with the Championship though until something changes and it wasn't hard to make my peace with that."
Well that's the great thing about the league, players play at the level that they are at. Perhaps the emphasis should be on the league with the championship an FA Cup style wingman to the main event. Teams will always live in hope of a giant killing and that should always be the driver for fans supporting their county in games against much stronger competition. There's always a chance of an upset. Bad weather, bad decisions on the line, off form players...a Cork v Kerry, Donegal v Cavan. There's no getting away from the fact that in any knockout competition in any sport you can always name 4 or so contenders and say with great certainty that one of them will be in the final and with some certainty that one of then will win it. That's the nature of knockout competitions with an array of competitors operating at different levels. That's why the League needs more prominence.

Joxer (Dublin) - Posts: 4700 - 29/01/2021 14:16:10    2329542

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Replying To BeJasus:  "A Mickey mouse competition , that affords Dublin a bedding in process of younger players,
while keeping their main players in Top physical condition for the business end of the season.

Predicting the same old, same old for the season ahead..

Big talk , fighting talk, at the beginning from usual suspects... ,
then cry foul and blame the money that Dublin earn..,
whilst "secretly hoping" Dublin hammer everybody else akin to similar margins they suffered themselves
in order to alleviate the embarrassment of their own efforts.

Tyrones , Mayos ,Kerrys of this world may not be good enough and fall short, but what goes on here is "Massacre" levels for over a decade now , but those counties will continue denying just how rubbish they really are,
burying their heads in the sand , continually living the past."
In fairness the other Leinster counties aren't the only ones burying their heads in sand. On this forum many Dublin fans don't want to look at the warning signs that the All Ireland series may be 10 years behind but following the same path towards irrelevance as the Leinster championship has (as was said by a previous poster on this topic and I have said on previous topics). Truth is winning All Irelands seems to be getting easier for Dublin, in the last 3 years in championship there has only being 1 match where they were in serious danger of actually losing, the drawn final in 2019 where Kerry had an extra man.
Also some Dublin fans also don't want to face up to what is probably the biggest factor in their current dominance, a funding model, requested by Dublin GAA, that was put in place in the noughties where the central GAA/ Irish government were funding Gaelic games development in Dublin way above the amount of registered players and that the funding would be administered by Dublin County board rather than the provincial councils as was the case for every other county. Rightly or wrongly Dublin requested and were granted being treated as a special case due to their population being much bigger than anywhere else. For this reason it always seems very arrogant when Dublin posters laugh at/ shoot down any discussions about issues around the competitiveness of current completions that they don't think is in their interest. It seems Dublin can only be treated as a special case when decisions are made in their interest.

bdbuddah (Meath) - Posts: 1354 - 29/01/2021 14:22:01    2329543

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Replying To Joxer:  "Well that's the great thing about the league, players play at the level that they are at. Perhaps the emphasis should be on the league with the championship an FA Cup style wingman to the main event. Teams will always live in hope of a giant killing and that should always be the driver for fans supporting their county in games against much stronger competition. There's always a chance of an upset. Bad weather, bad decisions on the line, off form players...a Cork v Kerry, Donegal v Cavan. There's no getting away from the fact that in any knockout competition in any sport you can always name 4 or so contenders and say with great certainty that one of them will be in the final and with some certainty that one of then will win it. That's the nature of knockout competitions with an array of competitors operating at different levels. That's why the League needs more prominence."
Absolutely. People get wrapped up in coming up with all sorts of structures for a new championship, but the answer is staring us in the face. Having the league as the main competition would be by far the best and fairest solution to a lot of the ills as far as I'm concerned.

Greenfield (Meath) - Posts: 522 - 29/01/2021 14:55:16    2329550

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Replying To Greenfield:  "Absolutely. People get wrapped up in coming up with all sorts of structures for a new championship, but the answer is staring us in the face. Having the league as the main competition would be by far the best and fairest solution to a lot of the ills as far as I'm concerned."
Given that division 1 would receive substantially more coverage, promotion, exposure than the other divisions, would this not just make the strongest teams stronger & create a bigger gap between the top teams & the rest?

Manners5 (Westmeath) - Posts: 20 - 29/01/2021 22:59:58    2329638

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Replying To Joxer:  "Not too sure what you expected him to say. He could have tried to be popular with his fellow Offaly folk and said slash Dublin GDF numbers, deny 2/3rds of the capital's population permission to join their local GAA club, have Dublin play all of their games in Semple Stadium, split the DCB in 4. All of these would be unprecedented measures in the context of the serial successes of other great teams in the past like Kilkenny hurlers (72 Leinsters) or Kerry footballers (81 Munsters). I must have missed the rebellions in Leinster and Munster over these serial winners. No doubt Dublin can generate more funds and have a nice population pool to draw upon but they must be doing something right. Would the outcome in Leinster but any different if Mayo or Kerry played there for the past 9 years? I doubt it. I think the big disappointment in Leinster has been the regression of Kildare and Meath. Why are Kildare and Meath so far off the level of Dublin but not only Dublin, Mayo, Kerry, Donegal, Galway? The answer to that question cannot be Dublin."
But Meath and Kildare are not far off those teams. As recent years have proven.

royaldunne (Meath) - Posts: 19449 - 30/01/2021 10:36:46    2329657

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Replying To Pericles:  "RD I'm not seeing any way that the Dubs would have won 10 titles in a row in any of the other provinces. Had they played Kerry in Munster in 11 I believe Kerry would have beaten them (should have beaten them in the final except for showboating) . Mayo did beat them in 12 and would likely have done that in Connacht had they met there. Don't know about 13... but the Dubs weren't a class apart that year either. 14 they were well beaten by Donegal and I think both Kerry and Mayo would have had a 50/50 chance against them too. 15, again no great gulf which would have guaranteed any province other than Leinster. 16, Mayo were 6 points the better team the first day out and the replay could have gone either way. 17 the same, nothing much in it. 18, 19 and 20 I agree the Dubs would have won whichever province they played in but not by the same margins they swept through Leinster. So not sure if they'd have managed more than 3 or 4 in a row anywhere else.

In a few other posts in different threads you seem to have suggested that after Leinster the Dubs take their foot off the gas. You're well entitled to believe that, but I don't understand why they'd be more motivated to win Leinster than win the AI.

I agree with posters who point to the disruption caused by large population growth, but at some point that will stabilise and Meath and Kildare will bounce back once the structures adapt to make use of all of those extra potential players."
Not more motivated but fearful of been split into 2 or 4. You cannot tell me that Dublin did not play in second gear for 55 minutes of all ire final. They did.
It helps to create the illusion that u have bought into that it's only Leinster fault and not a all ire problem, when they win 10 in a row. (I'll gladly put my house on that) maybe then maybe you will see what us in Leinster have known for the past 4/5 years.

royaldunne (Meath) - Posts: 19449 - 30/01/2021 10:41:17    2329659

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Replying To jackmeyhoffer:  "I doubt other provinces have the inferiority complex that seems to have taken over in Meath the last twenty years lad. I wonder about meath lads who want to talk up how great the dubs are,, many the members of the older great Meath teams would tell you to wise up!"
20 years ? Well in that time we have beat them convincely lad. (Also I am one of those old people) I recall jack Quinn playing and Ken rennicks so I hazard a guess I'm older than majority on here.
Just tell me how the other teams have done against them in last 8 years ?? With exception of Donegal ONCE.

royaldunne (Meath) - Posts: 19449 - 30/01/2021 10:48:50    2329662

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Replying To Greengrass:  "Unfortunately Dublin are in Leinster royaldunne so everything you said about competitiveness in Leinster is rendered null and void. Leinster is no longer a championship. There must be competitiveness for a championship to exist. When it comes to winning Leinster there is no competitiveness. The chairman of The Leinster Council can protest all he likes. The Leinster Championship is dead."
Oh I agree with you. I think the provincials need to be scrapped. Just pointing out the ignorance of some people to what is actually going on in Leinster

royaldunne (Meath) - Posts: 19449 - 30/01/2021 10:51:46    2329663

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Replying To Greenfield:  "Will be interesting to see what happens when crowds are allowed to return to the games.

Leinster is dead as a competition but the farce will continue as long as people are paying money to watch.

I missed one Meath championship match since the early 80s (2003 when I was working on the Special Olympics) but was really struggling the last few years. All that was keeping me going was the fact that there had to be a "first game to miss".
The Championship going ahead in 2020 has at least removed that roadblock as picking a first game to miss was taken out of my hands, so I will happily stop wasting money and time on these games in future.

I love the league competition and will keep at that as long as I can. I'm finished with the Championship though until something changes and it wasn't hard to make my peace with that."
I'm somewhat in a similar situation to your self. What if I missed the game. Now I won't miss obc (if it comes back ) or league games but tbh after this year I doubt I'll attend any Leinster games which means my family won't either upto 7 in the 7 seater at any time.

royaldunne (Meath) - Posts: 19449 - 30/01/2021 10:54:50    2329665

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If people Want to keep believing that Leinster is actually in any way competitive who do none of their teams apart from Dublin obviously reach latter stages of championship? If u put any county in Leinster in any other province they wouldn't be in the top two. That says enough. Football in Leinster is pathetic but we can hardly blame lads for losing interest etc when we see the way that one competitor is consistently favoured over them. It's good enough for them in a way coz they fell asleep at the wheel and let them get away with it.

the creeler (Cavan) - Posts: 512 - 30/01/2021 11:58:23    2329678

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Replying To Manners5:  "Given that division 1 would receive substantially more coverage, promotion, exposure than the other divisions, would this not just make the strongest teams stronger & create a bigger gap between the top teams & the rest?"
There could be issues with exposure etc but at least something could be done about that by GAA and counties themselves (remember the hype around carlowrising).

I think the league is the way to get back the competitiveness and interest in the game. I think the year that Carlow got promoted Brendan Murphy played the league and then opted out out of the championship squad to go to the US didn't he? That said more about the situation than I ever could.

To have the main part of the inter county season based around a lob-sided knockout format is daft. Take Wicklow and Mayo for example (no offence to either county). Say both prepare for a championship beginning in May. Wicklow are gone from the competition by the end of June. Squad breaks up and goes back to their clubs. Mayo go on until August, so they get more games, more collective training for 2 months and at the end of the year have gone further in their development.
The following year they start at the same time but already with the benefit of the extra work from the year before, so are in stronger position, so likely to have another extended season. The gap just grows and grows.

At least with the league competition everyone is working off the same number of games and the timeframe shouldn't differ by much. And you have a real way of tracking how your team is developing from season to season.

Greenfield (Meath) - Posts: 522 - 30/01/2021 12:35:31    2329690

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Replying To royaldunne:  "I'm somewhat in a similar situation to your self. What if I missed the game. Now I won't miss obc (if it comes back ) or league games but tbh after this year I doubt I'll attend any Leinster games which means my family won't either upto 7 in the 7 seater at any time."
100%.

Would love to get to the league games this year, especially as we have a rare enough trip to Castlebar.

Not bothered after that.

Greenfield (Meath) - Posts: 522 - 30/01/2021 12:38:37    2329691

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Replying To Greenfield:  "Will be interesting to see what happens when crowds are allowed to return to the games.

Leinster is dead as a competition but the farce will continue as long as people are paying money to watch.

I missed one Meath championship match since the early 80s (2003 when I was working on the Special Olympics) but was really struggling the last few years. All that was keeping me going was the fact that there had to be a "first game to miss".
The Championship going ahead in 2020 has at least removed that roadblock as picking a first game to miss was taken out of my hands, so I will happily stop wasting money and time on these games in future.

I love the league competition and will keep at that as long as I can. I'm finished with the Championship though until something changes and it wasn't hard to make my peace with that."
I know what you mean, it's getting very frustrating at this stage, eventually the turkeys will stop showing up for the turkey shoot!

But it is hard not to go to the games, I've been supporting Meath and attending games since I can remember and I've never considered not going, even when I know we're playing in a kangaroo competition.

The Leinster championship has been allowed to die by the Gaa and every Leinster county can take their portion of the blame for that, either by their actions or inaction in allowing the Dubs to create a monoply (which has now established itself at national level).

Sean Kelly set up the committee which ultimately funded the Dubs current success, the rest of us now need a Kelly committee of our own, otherwise the championship could get a little bit tedious (I mean the AI championship, the Gaa seem to have no interest in Leinster)

Htaem (Meath) - Posts: 8657 - 30/01/2021 12:56:42    2329697

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Replying To Htaem:  "I know what you mean, it's getting very frustrating at this stage, eventually the turkeys will stop showing up for the turkey shoot!

But it is hard not to go to the games, I've been supporting Meath and attending games since I can remember and I've never considered not going, even when I know we're playing in a kangaroo competition.

The Leinster championship has been allowed to die by the Gaa and every Leinster county can take their portion of the blame for that, either by their actions or inaction in allowing the Dubs to create a monoply (which has now established itself at national level).

Sean Kelly set up the committee which ultimately funded the Dubs current success, the rest of us now need a Kelly committee of our own, otherwise the championship could get a little bit tedious (I mean the AI championship, the Gaa seem to have no interest in Leinster)"
The blame lies specifically with the big counties of Kildare and yourselves, and maybe Laois too. Dublin have never played Laois in Laois in Leinster champ... ever! Meath and Kildare's grounds are not fit for purpose so Dublin don't have to travel because you can't accommodate them, that's farcical when other counties have improved their grounds such as Portlaoise and Tullamore.

republicofcloone (Leitrim) - Posts: 375 - 30/01/2021 15:12:04    2329714

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Replying To republicofcloone:  "The blame lies specifically with the big counties of Kildare and yourselves, and maybe Laois too. Dublin have never played Laois in Laois in Leinster champ... ever! Meath and Kildare's grounds are not fit for purpose so Dublin don't have to travel because you can't accommodate them, that's farcical when other counties have improved their grounds such as Portlaoise and Tullamore."
I don't want to turn this into another thread about Dublin. Think we have enough of them.

Not sure what you are trying to say here though.

You say it's our fault Dublin don't have to travel to play us or Kildare because we haven't upgraded our grounds.
Then you credit Laois for upgrading portlaoise and say that they have never played Dublin there.

Have I missed something?

Greenfield (Meath) - Posts: 522 - 30/01/2021 15:50:11    2329722

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Replying To republicofcloone:  "The blame lies specifically with the big counties of Kildare and yourselves, and maybe Laois too. Dublin have never played Laois in Laois in Leinster champ... ever! Meath and Kildare's grounds are not fit for purpose so Dublin don't have to travel because you can't accommodate them, that's farcical when other counties have improved their grounds such as Portlaoise and Tullamore."
I think the issue of where Dublin play their leinster championship games is a bit of a red herring to be honest. Granted it would be nice to play them at home in a Leinster QF or even SF, but Leinster finals should always be in Croker.

Meath, Kilare and Laois etc had no issue playing Dublin in Croker when we were winning so it shouldn't really be an issue now and moving the Dubs out of Croker now is not likely to change much anyway.

Although I do completely accept that the state of our home ground is deplorable and that's been a failing of consecutive county boards over a long period of time.

The real issue though is getting the other Leinster teams back to a position where they can beat Dublin again and that will require a lot of hard work, dedication, know-how and funding.

Hard to see the Gaa making a meaningful effort to do that though.

Htaem (Meath) - Posts: 8657 - 30/01/2021 16:15:42    2329726

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Replying To Greenfield:  "There could be issues with exposure etc but at least something could be done about that by GAA and counties themselves (remember the hype around carlowrising).

I think the league is the way to get back the competitiveness and interest in the game. I think the year that Carlow got promoted Brendan Murphy played the league and then opted out out of the championship squad to go to the US didn't he? That said more about the situation than I ever could.

To have the main part of the inter county season based around a lob-sided knockout format is daft. Take Wicklow and Mayo for example (no offence to either county). Say both prepare for a championship beginning in May. Wicklow are gone from the competition by the end of June. Squad breaks up and goes back to their clubs. Mayo go on until August, so they get more games, more collective training for 2 months and at the end of the year have gone further in their development.
The following year they start at the same time but already with the benefit of the extra work from the year before, so are in stronger position, so likely to have another extended season. The gap just grows and grows.

At least with the league competition everyone is working off the same number of games and the timeframe shouldn't differ by much. And you have a real way of tracking how your team is developing from season to season."
Its not the number of games a teams get that improves them, its the standard they play the games at. If Galway stay playing at division 1 standard all year, & Sligo at division 4, the gap between Galway & Sligo gets bigger.

This actually reflects the Leinster Championship, whereby Dublin are the only team in the province to consistently maintain division 1 status for the last 10 years. They have gotten stronger year on year whilst the other counties have fallen behind. Hence the gap has increased.

If the current league format was adopted for championship, you will end up with 4/5 strong counties who will consistently get stronger than the rest, followed by 3/4 yoyo counties.

In terms of generating interest, again it would lead to more exposure to the top division.

Manners5 (Westmeath) - Posts: 20 - 30/01/2021 16:53:39    2329733

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Replying To Htaem:  "I think the issue of where Dublin play their leinster championship games is a bit of a red herring to be honest. Granted it would be nice to play them at home in a Leinster QF or even SF, but Leinster finals should always be in Croker.

Meath, Kilare and Laois etc had no issue playing Dublin in Croker when we were winning so it shouldn't really be an issue now and moving the Dubs out of Croker now is not likely to change much anyway.

Although I do completely accept that the state of our home ground is deplorable and that's been a failing of consecutive county boards over a long period of time.

The real issue though is getting the other Leinster teams back to a position where they can beat Dublin again and that will require a lot of hard work, dedication, know-how and funding.

Hard to see the Gaa making a meaningful effort to do that though."
I think the gaa's silence on this issue means we're all on our own Htaem.

I was looking at another forum the other night where a poster on it said he/she was very angry by dubs telling the rest of the country to shut up and that their volunteers need to up their game and that there teams need to just work harder to get up to dublins level, he/she wanted to know why weren't the dubs told to just up their game and work harder back in 02/03 by the gaa.

It's hard to argue with that poster.

KingdomBoy1 (Kerry) - Posts: 14092 - 30/01/2021 17:14:23    2329735

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Replying To Manners5:  "Its not the number of games a teams get that improves them, its the standard they play the games at. If Galway stay playing at division 1 standard all year, & Sligo at division 4, the gap between Galway & Sligo gets bigger.

This actually reflects the Leinster Championship, whereby Dublin are the only team in the province to consistently maintain division 1 status for the last 10 years. They have gotten stronger year on year whilst the other counties have fallen behind. Hence the gap has increased.

If the current league format was adopted for championship, you will end up with 4/5 strong counties who will consistently get stronger than the rest, followed by 3/4 yoyo counties.

In terms of generating interest, again it would lead to more exposure to the top division."
I take your point about the standard of games making a difference, but I think making sure everyone's season is the same length would be of benefit to the developing counties.

You could make it 3 divisions of 10 which might help the yo-yoing.

Greenfield (Meath) - Posts: 522 - 30/01/2021 18:14:54    2329746

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