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Westmeath Hurling thread

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Clonkill missing Niall Mitchell, Darragh Egerton and Rian Holding tomorrow so anything less than a comfortable win for Castletown would be a surprise. Those three lads are the spine of a team in complete transition following 4-5 high profile retirements or lads simply not having the legs anymore, Brendan Murtagh, Two Dowdalls, Andrew Mitchell, Alan McGrath, Shane Power and Mark Keegan are hard to replace and their replacements will need 2 years to get close to their standard. Clonkill surely targeting Plunketts and Gaels matches as must win and tomorrow is damage limitation

Claretandblue (Westmeath) - Posts: 1892 - 03/08/2024 17:04:33    2563706

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Great win for Ringtown in senior B championship this evening in a high scoring match, scored 1-27 and won by 4 despite conceding 4 goals. Delvin prob the favourites to win this championship so this result was a surprise

Claretandblue (Westmeath) - Posts: 1892 - 03/08/2024 22:06:04    2563733

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Lads do ye think the standard of the club championship has dropped?

LockLeanGayl (Westmeath) - Posts: 257 - 04/08/2024 12:14:21    2563756

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Replying To LockLeanGayl:  "Lads do ye think the standard of the club championship has dropped?"
Whatever about having dropped, the senior standard has at least stalled and hasn't moved on at the same rate or levels as other counties. Outside the senior championship I would say it's definitely dipped in recent years

CleanShoulder (Westmeath) - Posts: 325 - 04/08/2024 12:46:11    2563762

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Replying To CleanShoulder:  "Whatever about having dropped, the senior standard has at least stalled and hasn't moved on at the same rate or levels as other counties. Outside the senior championship I would say it's definitely dipped in recent years"
Castletown and Raharney are at a high level, we'll see later if Clonkill are near that. Gaels have a bit of work to do

Dheen (Westmeath) - Posts: 933 - 04/08/2024 12:56:13    2563764

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Replying To LockLeanGayl:  "Lads do ye think the standard of the club championship has dropped?"
Did we not have an unbelievable county final last year that everyone was raving about? Short memories on some people here

westmeathgaa11 (Westmeath) - Posts: 286 - 04/08/2024 13:25:08    2563767

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Replying To CleanShoulder:  "Whatever about having dropped, the senior standard has at least stalled and hasn't moved on at the same rate or levels as other counties. Outside the senior championship I would say it's definitely dipped in recent years"
What other counties? The two top teams in Offaly played each other in championship on Friday evening, Kilcormac beat Rynagh's by 26 points, our top four teams are pretty close

Claretandblue (Westmeath) - Posts: 1892 - 04/08/2024 13:31:13    2563769

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Replying To westmeathgaa11:  "Did we not have an unbelievable county final last year that everyone was raving about? Short memories on some people here"
It was a close game and very exciting with a couple of very good individual displays, but not necessarily to a very high standard

CleanShoulder (Westmeath) - Posts: 325 - 04/08/2024 13:39:25    2563770

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Replying To Dheen:  "Castletown and Raharney are at a high level, we'll see later if Clonkill are near that. Gaels have a bit of work to do"
Yes, Castletown and Raharney are up there but have been at that level for a while now, Clonkill were there but in a bit of a transition at the moment and will be there or thereabouts again soon

CleanShoulder (Westmeath) - Posts: 325 - 04/08/2024 13:42:59    2563771

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Replying To Claretandblue:  "What other counties? The two top teams in Offaly played each other in championship on Friday evening, Kilcormac beat Rynagh's by 26 points, our top four teams are pretty close"
They're not top two teams in offaly. KK followed by shinrone then Ballinamere. Rynaghs would be 4th. Beaten semi finalists last two seasons

Greenandgoldie (Westmeath) - Posts: 154 - 04/08/2024 14:14:45    2563774

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Replying To Claretandblue:  "What other counties? The two top teams in Offaly played each other in championship on Friday evening, Kilcormac beat Rynagh's by 26 points, our top four teams are pretty close"
Come off it, it's plain to be seen that our club sides have fallen well behind the standards of the top hurling counties, the gap has gotten wider in recent years. Just because there's a level of competitiveness internally doesn't mean it's of an exceptionally high standard in comparison.

CleanShoulder (Westmeath) - Posts: 325 - 04/08/2024 15:32:03    2563786

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Replying To CleanShoulder:  "Come off it, it's plain to be seen that our club sides have fallen well behind the standards of the top hurling counties, the gap has gotten wider in recent years. Just because there's a level of competitiveness internally doesn't mean it's of an exceptionally high standard in comparison."
Have they not always been behind the standards of the top hurling counties? Our top clubs are still competitive with the top clubs of laois offally etc which is to be expected. Our clubs were never competitive with the top clubs of the top counties so I think it's unfair to say the standards have fallen

westmeathgaa11 (Westmeath) - Posts: 286 - 04/08/2024 16:24:27    2563789

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Replying To westmeathgaa11:  "Have they not always been behind the standards of the top hurling counties? Our top clubs are still competitive with the top clubs of laois offally etc which is to be expected. Our clubs were never competitive with the top clubs of the top counties so I think it's unfair to say the standards have fallen"
Agree

Gaaforlife2023 (Longford) - Posts: 508 - 04/08/2024 17:03:20    2563795

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Replying To CleanShoulder:  "Come off it, it's plain to be seen that our club sides have fallen well behind the standards of the top hurling counties, the gap has gotten wider in recent years. Just because there's a level of competitiveness internally doesn't mean it's of an exceptionally high standard in comparison."
Maybe some but still not much different to other years for years westmeath is bit kk wexford Dublin clubs so I think this is exaggerated.

Still a decent championship at senior A . Very harsh only last week or two ago saying was a high quality match between raharney and Castletown. Which is it.
OK not quite near kk or dubs championship but it's not that.

Gaaforlife2023 (Longford) - Posts: 508 - 04/08/2024 17:07:17    2563796

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Replying To westmeathgaa11:  "Have they not always been behind the standards of the top hurling counties? Our top clubs are still competitive with the top clubs of laois offally etc which is to be expected. Our clubs were never competitive with the top clubs of the top counties so I think it's unfair to say the standards have fallen"
Clonkill drew with ballyboden in 2018

Greenandgoldie (Westmeath) - Posts: 154 - 04/08/2024 17:14:05    2563797

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Replying To Greenandgoldie:  "Clonkill drew with ballyboden in 2018"
Was after being a tough week for clonkill before that game

westmeathgaa11 (Westmeath) - Posts: 286 - 04/08/2024 17:45:57    2563801

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Replying To CleanShoulder:  "Come off it, it's plain to be seen that our club sides have fallen well behind the standards of the top hurling counties, the gap has gotten wider in recent years. Just because there's a level of competitiveness internally doesn't mean it's of an exceptionally high standard in comparison."
Based on what exactly? We've never had a club side come close to even reaching a Leinster club final so not sure how much has changed?

Claretandblue (Westmeath) - Posts: 1892 - 04/08/2024 18:43:10    2563808

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Shaping up to be a Castletown Raharney final.
0-27 is a big score put up by Castletown this evening with a nice junk of it coming from play. Clonkill battled hard, and got some joy off long balls into the square.
They will get better once Egerton, Mitchell and Holding are back and will be looking to sneak in 3rd ahead of the Gaels.
Most importantly hopefully Luke Loughlin makes a speedy recovery, never nice to see such scenes in the park. He scored a fantastic solo goal in the first half.

Dheen (Westmeath) - Posts: 933 - 04/08/2024 18:58:51    2563811

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Did our new senior manager go to any club games this weekend. I seen his club charleville well beat in cork

Greenandgoldie (Westmeath) - Posts: 154 - 04/08/2024 19:03:58    2563813

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Replying To Claretandblue:  "Based on what exactly? We've never had a club side come close to even reaching a Leinster club final so not sure how much has changed?"
From looking at championship games in other counties, I feel that in the last 5 or 6 years, the speed of their game and quality of touch, intensity etc has moved onto a level not far off where intercounty was 10-12 years ago, and the same just simply can't be said of our own club championship. We had a great opener to the championship this year, but that was still a way off what's playing out elsewhere, it was our best two sides and kind of the exception to the rule, we had 4 pretty mediocre games after that, I didn't see today's game unfortunately.
The question that was posed asked has our standard of club championship dropped and I stand by my answer, yes, at best it's stalled and even by that virtue it's dropped. We had 3-4 contenders for a few years and I think it's a 2 horse race at the moment, coupled with the fact that for a few years any of the teams in senior were capable of taking a scalp on a given day, the likes of pollard or Delvin, but that's not the case with the bottom 2 teams anymore. Correct me if I'm wrong?

CleanShoulder (Westmeath) - Posts: 325 - 04/08/2024 19:05:09    2563814

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