National Forum

Sligo Game

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This must rank as one of the worst displays I've seen. As frustrated as I feel I'm sure the players must feel much worse. They looked very flatfooted and showed a lack of hunger as if they were overtrained or unfit. Difficult to watch opponents able to solo the ball freely and our players can't keep up with them. How many times did their midfielders waltz the length of the field without a finger being laid on them.? We regressed to the same old pattern as under previous managers of going nowhere with the ball and it was much easier to lay off the ball than have a shot. We cannot handle players that run at us and this was clear even in the Carlow game. We appeared to have no plan and players were unclear and unsure of what their role was.A huge amount of energy was expended without any real purpose with a lot of the play going down cul de sacs. Some players were trying to cover vast areas of space as we lacked any apparent structure especially when moves broke down.
With promotion surely gone at this early stage the fear is that interest will wane and the gloss of a new manager is fast fading. Sorry to be so pessimistic but many of us felt that this was the beginning of real improvement on the back of improved performances from underage squads and now real investment from promoters.
Can some posters give me some hope to lift me from my despair after watching our county teams for over 60 years.

Optimisticobserver (Wicklow) - Posts: 125 - 06/02/2023 12:23:38    2456850

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Replying To Optimisticobserver:  "This must rank as one of the worst displays I've seen. As frustrated as I feel I'm sure the players must feel much worse. They looked very flatfooted and showed a lack of hunger as if they were overtrained or unfit. Difficult to watch opponents able to solo the ball freely and our players can't keep up with them. How many times did their midfielders waltz the length of the field without a finger being laid on them.? We regressed to the same old pattern as under previous managers of going nowhere with the ball and it was much easier to lay off the ball than have a shot. We cannot handle players that run at us and this was clear even in the Carlow game. We appeared to have no plan and players were unclear and unsure of what their role was.A huge amount of energy was expended without any real purpose with a lot of the play going down cul de sacs. Some players were trying to cover vast areas of space as we lacked any apparent structure especially when moves broke down.
With promotion surely gone at this early stage the fear is that interest will wane and the gloss of a new manager is fast fading. Sorry to be so pessimistic but many of us felt that this was the beginning of real improvement on the back of improved performances from underage squads and now real investment from promoters.
Can some posters give me some hope to lift me from my despair after watching our county teams for over 60 years."
Not having been at this game , I'm not going to directly comment on it , but, I will give an overall opinion on the points you bring up. A lot of what you said applied to Sligo last week, so for us this result was a pleasant surprise. We can but hope that this will be maintained. The frustration for spectators from counties in Div 4 stems largely from the type of football that their teams play. This possession based defensive game plan of retaining the ball at all costs when poorly implemented, is surely the ugliest field game in the world . Any wonder then that after 2 or 3 games of this dribble supporters start getting restless . We go to these games for two reasons 1, to support our county and 2, to be entertained. Managers will say , we don't do entertainment we aim to win matches, nice or ugly. I would suggest to any manager of a Div4 team with aspirations, forget about copying the Div 1 teams style of play and implement an offensive,attacking fast moving game plan. Not all top division games are thrillers, many are dire, but at least the potential is always there for a quality game. Nothing is as abysmal as poor teams trying to play the ball through the hands from the back and repeatedly turning over possession. So for what it's worth, my advice to managers from lower division teams is: discard the reliance on stats and zones and clipboards and concentrate on playing fast attacking football and when your players are able to do that by all means gradually introduce the more structured game plans that will be needed in the higher divisions.

Maggiepie (Sligo) - Posts: 230 - 06/02/2023 21:23:47    2456929

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