Fionn (Dublin) - Posts: 3983 - 19/04/2023 10:38:29    2471734

Only 5 of those lads who started last night started on the All Ireland minor winning team so there is hope yet. With all the talent on the 2021 team why wasn't there a better selection of players. Why leave Kinsella on the bench who has a record of scoring. Why play a full forward line again this week that scored nothing against Westmeath and only one point last night?

Royalmeath2 (Meath) - Posts: 9 - 19/04/2023 10:42:36    2471736

Blackspot09 (Meath) - Posts: 1003 - 19/04/2023 11:54:13    2471761

I think Cathal o bric should be given the under 20s next year.He knows his winning minor team inside out and what they need to make them tick.I think a manager who wins a minor all Ireland should have the chance at under 20s with his team.Not knocking any other manager but surely if it's not broke dont fix it.

Proudroyal (Meath) - Posts: 294 - 19/04/2023 13:31:26    2471779

Is young Kinsella not injured and when he did come on only last a short while. We were in a similar position a few years back in Down v Derry in an All Ireland semi final

199710 (Meath) - Posts: 120 - 19/04/2023 14:06:18    2471785

Blackspot09 (Meath) - Posts: 1003 - 19/04/2023 14:41:32    2471790

Very disappointing but lets not throw the baby out with the bathwater. The truth is that there are a number of very fine footballers on that team and it is unfortunate that they may not have reached their full potential and that must be devastating for them and the management.

As many have said there really does need to be a good look at how players and teams develop from minor to under 20's and like many things in life the answers are probably complex.

Let's hope a good review is done and as much as possible done to develop next year's team. Also, lets hope that the players that are finishing up at under 20's level this year are kept in the'system' or at least a fair number of them anyway.

We certainly need to develop the players we have from our team last evening, perhaps even more than the Dubs need to as our talent is a lot scarcer than they have.

stillaroyal (Meath) - Posts: 225 - 19/04/2023 14:44:18    2471791

summerof09 (Meath) - Posts: 324 - 19/04/2023 15:05:28    2471795

While obliviously disappointed to lose to Dublin last night, there are some very good footballers in that group and we will see plenty of them in a senior jersey. I'm sure the management are as gutted as everyone else, and the reality is that they have given six or seven years of their lives to this group and Meath football. At the start of that journey if you said that we would have a Leinster MFC title, you would jump at that but human nature is that we always want more.
We only beat Offaly by a point in the delayed 2020 Leinster MFC final and they didn't win a game at U20 this year.
One of the things that always strikes me is that we have a great record against Dublin at minor but that is reversed at U20. If we have a good minor team, the majority of them progress three years later to play U20. The Dublin U20 team often bears no resemblance to the minor team from three years before, such is their pick of players and conditioning.
I always remember Barry Callaghan's minor team which beat Dublin by 10 points and then lost a semi-final after extra time to Kildare, who walked the Leinster final. Three years later we had most of those lads playing U20 but Dublin came with 13 new players compared to their minor team and beat us.

Roger (Meath) - Posts: 478 - 19/04/2023 15:27:51    2471799

Thunderstruck (Meath) - Posts: 469 - 19/04/2023 17:24:26    2471831

royaldunne (Meath) - Posts: 19449 - 19/04/2023 17:27:55    2471832

This team has consistently played well in all their 1st half games and played very poorly in all of their 2nd half of games, surely this is something we should have been working on but no again last night we were very poor against a medicore Dublin side.
Why keep players on the pitch for most of the game who are not performing, Dublin were making positional changes plus making substitution that were making an impact on the game.
We needed to bring on forwards when we were 5 points down with about 12 minutes to go. We had the likes of John McDonagh and Christian Finlay both good forwards sitting on d bench, your heading out of the championship so you have to go for broke and ditch your defensive mindset.

FairRoyal71 (Meath) - Posts: 13 - 19/04/2023 18:03:23    2471845

Odyssey1 (Meath) - Posts: 8 - 19/04/2023 18:47:41    2471854

bert09 (Meath) - Posts: 1807 - 19/04/2023 21:28:31    2471878

Meathball (Meath) - Posts: 140 - 19/04/2023 23:06:48    2471881

So after 2 years of 20s crashing out in the semifinal what players have we found that could potentially end up playing senior county football.
Diarmuid Moriarty 2002
Frayne 2003
Ciaran Caulfield 2003
Ciaran McCarrick 2002
Conor Gray 2003
Ruairi Kinsella 2003

Might be missing 1 or 2 names but even some of the lads listed arnt ready yet

houndinbound (Meath) - Posts: 22 - 20/04/2023 08:37:57    2471889

I find it very arrogant of some Meath media commentators to say this was a very poor and average Dublin U20's team. Well that must make Meath extremely poor so. This Meath team lost to Laois only a few weeks ago who then got walloped by 14 points by Kildare on Tuesday night. Also excuses being offered up by the same commentators such as injuries the weather etc are also laughable. In fairness to the manager, he wasn't making any of those excuses and said every team suffers injuries, which they do. Meath were beaten fair and square on Tuesday night by the better team. Dublin had far more punch up front. Meath were solid from 1-10 but after that Meath didn't have a reliable inside forward who could score consistently and be comfortable 1v1 with their marker. Something which seems to be a problem for most Meath teams at the moment.

BigJoe14 (Meath) - Posts: 997 - 20/04/2023 09:38:28    2471894

Meathball (Meath) - Posts: 140 - 20/04/2023 09:50:00    2471896

Blackspot09 (Meath) - Posts: 1003 - 20/04/2023 09:58:39    2471898

This was a Meath team able to compete with Dublin. We broke even at midfield. But we never attacked the game. We seemed to play to contain Dublin, content to recycle the ball and sit off them. Our tackle count seemed very low and we rarely went at them in pods of runners, we did it a few times in the first half and it led to Kinlough's point and Conor Gray's wide. As well as that we never wanted to attack quickly, we would win long kickouts and then pass it backwards which was infuriating. I think we have to be careful of ordaining these guys as good footballers. A lot of them have the traits/raw talent to become good footballers but they still have loads to learn and areas to improve on. They can get there and their commitment does seem very strong so hopefully they use this as fuel and get better. As for people talking about next year 20's team being stronger I don't see it. A lot of the key cogs on this team (Hogan, Caulfield, Gray, Frayne) are full age. And to be honest the progression of a lot of the minor team has been disappointing. I trust O'Bric to maximise the talent that is there, but I don't think the talent on paper next year will be as good as it was this year

LeitrimRoyal99 (Meath) - Posts: 1523 - 20/04/2023 10:04:22    2471899