Meath Forum

Meath Club Hurling Season 2024

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No winning bounce from senior hurlers. Going to be along few weeks. Nightmare of a journey to the Ards.

ParcT (Meath) - Posts: 2 - 21/04/2024 07:36:26    2539433

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Replying To ParcT:  "No winning bounce from senior hurlers. Going to be along few weeks. Nightmare of a journey to the Ards."
They appeared to have put up a decent performace, even if the result did not match it. Only going on reports mind, but the sending off cannot have helped things. They had the deficit back to 3 pts at the time.
Did a number of players double up by playing u20s the night before? Surely, that would have taken it's toll?
Upcoming games will be very tough and, on paper, a level above what they played at the weekend

hurlingcowboy101 (Meath) - Posts: 2 - 22/04/2024 09:48:16    2539729

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A disappointing start in what was in all likelihood a decider for bottom spot. Meath and Down are some distance off the level of Laois, Offaly, Westmeath and Kerry. Unfortunately I can see a few tough days ahead.

men_of_49 (Meath) - Posts: 1992 - 25/04/2024 21:50:29    2540677

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If the Kerry game was at home I'd give us a 1 in 4 chance as we've a decent record vs. Kerry when we play at home; winning in 2017 and 2021, and only losing by 2 and 5 points in the other 2 games we've played at home in recent years.

Unfortunately it's down in Kerry, where our record is abysmal. Our last 7 games vs. Kerry away have had an average losing margin of 15 points.

It'd take a miracle to get anything out of the Laois, Offaly and Westmeath games.

CastleBravo (Meath) - Posts: 1646 - 26/04/2024 11:59:45    2540737

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7-29 we conceeded today. Can we just pull out altogether for 2024. We're embarrassing ourselves

Selwyn (Meath) - Posts: 351 - 27/04/2024 18:41:24    2540985

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Replying To Selwyn:  "7-29 we conceeded today. Can we just pull out altogether for 2024. We're embarrassing ourselves"
Play Power Prevails OMG

CrookedSticks (Fermanagh) - Posts: 2 - 27/04/2024 20:48:28    2541024

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If my sources are correct, that's our 2nd worst ever beating in championship hurling. Worst being a 4-28 to 0-08 pasting by Offaly in 1998.

On one hand Offaly were All Ireland champions in waiting, but on the other you'll often hear it said that was during the golden era of Meath hurling.

CastleBravo (Meath) - Posts: 1646 - 28/04/2024 14:56:48    2541169

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Replying To CastleBravo:  "If my sources are correct, that's our 2nd worst ever beating in championship hurling. Worst being a 4-28 to 0-08 pasting by Offaly in 1998.

On one hand Offaly were All Ireland champions in waiting, but on the other you'll often hear it said that was during the golden era of Meath hurling."
Laoise are certainly not all ireland champions in waiting and that was very good hurling team competing in division 1. Shudder to think what any one of the top teams 5 would do to Meath at the moment. And certainly not fault of Clynch who was taking on a no one team.

Think the most dissappointing thing are while it is clear we don't have the team to compete in Joe McDonogh, it is the level of beating that they are taking, no way they are 30 points worse. Panel needs to be cleared out ahead of the 2025 season for any new manager coming in, they don't need those player managers in there.

On a positive note, ran Antrim to extra time in minor and 20s had a decent campaign even if it did finish with a big beating. Love to see the likes of Pat O'Halloran or someone like that take a shot at this team.

off_the_wall (Roscommon) - Posts: 64 - 28/04/2024 16:08:58    2541186

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The current panel would not win the christy ring cup lets be honest
Last years panel was alot stronger and even still was short players
A squad made up mostly of senior b and intermediate club players is never going to compete at joe mc level
Alot of guys unavailable or out of the country or in with county football panel etc
Fair play to anybody give there time in the current situation
A meath hurling squad with all the top players available from the senior a clubs can compete at this level , but the pool is small when 9 or 10 lads are missing there depth isnt there to compete.
I wonder is there any red faces from the push to get rid of the last manager now?

hurlit (Meath) - Posts: 416 - 28/04/2024 23:25:14    2541333

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Lets face it the county board's approach to hurling is fairly bleak. Still all about football which is hard to understand when we haven't been competitive for 20 years in football. Maybe it would be a better approach for meath and westmeath to join up for county hurling and at least be competitive in the leinster championship.

Rickoshay (Meath) - Posts: 10 - 29/04/2024 09:10:13    2541367

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Replying To Rickoshay:  "Lets face it the county board's approach to hurling is fairly bleak. Still all about football which is hard to understand when we haven't been competitive for 20 years in football. Maybe it would be a better approach for meath and westmeath to join up for county hurling and at least be competitive in the leinster championship."
I agree fully with the county boards approach is uselss tbf. Novel idea, I think it was banded about a few years ago with the Ulster counties joining together as "Team Ulster" to make them more competitive in the Liam McCarthy, could have been Sunday Game talk either.
It would be interesting seeing maybe Meath, Westmeath and Longford amalgamate for the Leinster Championship, same as wicklow/Kildare/Louth. Obviously it will never happen but how do you think they would fare? Offaly/Laois together aswell.
Connacht could see Mayo/Sligo/Roscommon and Leitrim join and compete in the Munster Championship.

Completely Novel idea but would be interesting to see.

bountyboy22 (USA) - Posts: 30 - 29/04/2024 10:38:00    2541406

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Replying To off_the_wall:  "Laoise are certainly not all ireland champions in waiting and that was very good hurling team competing in division 1. Shudder to think what any one of the top teams 5 would do to Meath at the moment. And certainly not fault of Clynch who was taking on a no one team.

Think the most dissappointing thing are while it is clear we don't have the team to compete in Joe McDonogh, it is the level of beating that they are taking, no way they are 30 points worse. Panel needs to be cleared out ahead of the 2025 season for any new manager coming in, they don't need those player managers in there.

On a positive note, ran Antrim to extra time in minor and 20s had a decent campaign even if it did finish with a big beating. Love to see the likes of Pat O'Halloran or someone like that take a shot at this team."
Yeah and u15 and u16s teams seems to be going well in their respective competitions. There seems to be a good cohort of younger players wanting to play hurling for the county which is a positive. Hopefully the county board and hurling committees tap into and promote the development of these lads to give them an opportunity.

hedgefund (Meath) - Posts: 12 - 29/04/2024 12:06:08    2541443

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We can talk about all the under age teams doing well all we like but the problem is the amount of these players we bring onto the senior panel. If you look back the last 5-6 minor and u20's/u21's teams there were some outstanding players on those teams that are now just not playing with the senior county team for one reason or another.
How do we make it more appealing to those young lads? Certainly being hammered by Laois wont help..

We simply need proper buy in from the county board not just the current lip service but unfortunately i can never see that happening. They are happy with where hurling is at the moment which is nowhere really and once no one is shouting at them they are happy. Look at all the managers from minor up to senior, none of them will cause a fuss. Look at the hurling chairman, there is none and the one we had did not cause a fuss. All appointed for a reason, to do their best with what they have and don't annoy anyone at county board level.

I would sort of understand this if we were making progress with the big ball but i think we all know where that's going. Any way fair play to the current crop of hurlers ( except the 3-4 who decided that an all Ireland winning coach was not up to Meath's standards) they are still putting in a massive commitment for little reward so hopefully the small hurling contingent in the county can support them as best they can and hopefully better times to come.

Tobefair80 (Meath) - Posts: 60 - 29/04/2024 13:14:10    2541470

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Replying To Tobefair80:  "We can talk about all the under age teams doing well all we like but the problem is the amount of these players we bring onto the senior panel. If you look back the last 5-6 minor and u20's/u21's teams there were some outstanding players on those teams that are now just not playing with the senior county team for one reason or another.
How do we make it more appealing to those young lads? Certainly being hammered by Laois wont help..

We simply need proper buy in from the county board not just the current lip service but unfortunately i can never see that happening. They are happy with where hurling is at the moment which is nowhere really and once no one is shouting at them they are happy. Look at all the managers from minor up to senior, none of them will cause a fuss. Look at the hurling chairman, there is none and the one we had did not cause a fuss. All appointed for a reason, to do their best with what they have and don't annoy anyone at county board level.

I would sort of understand this if we were making progress with the big ball but i think we all know where that's going. Any way fair play to the current crop of hurlers ( except the 3-4 who decided that an all Ireland winning coach was not up to Meath's standards) they are still putting in a massive commitment for little reward so hopefully the small hurling contingent in the county can support them as best they can and hopefully better times to come."
Sure its been a shambles since Nicky left. There's little to no support from the CB for any sort of senior development on the hurling front. This year lads dropped away as they knew what they were facing into and some had been hanging on well past their due date as it was. There are lads involved over the last couple of years from my own club who don't even stand out in club training/match's but they will happily commit to filling a county training squad but will never make the 15.

you can trace my comments on this back to when Bulfin took over. Cristy ring just tapped over the massive cracks. And we will probably do well in it again next year and the following be relegated again. Until a proper management team(not made up of previous lads and managers) get the role and proper support from CB, then we will continue to watch underage talent fade away.

I'm not trying to Dig out clynch as damage done predates him.

Unfortunately we are stuck in a football county and small ball is a hinderance.

Irish_downunder (Meath) - Posts: 631 - 29/04/2024 13:58:47    2541490

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hard to know where meath hurling goes but probably has to get players buying in instead of whinging to the county board, at the end of the day its very hard to make the case that meath football is as bad as meath hurling when the operate in different levels. meath footballers are mid table div 2 team , meath hurlers struggle to dtay in div 3 and are usually div 4. meath hurlers getting hockeyed in tier 2 competition, where meath footballers won theirs. id say until we see meath footballers in div 4 of league then you cant really say were as weak in football as hurling. i suppose the starkest statement is if county board put their full effort into hurling would meath u20 hurlers reach a leinster final or win one? the answer would be no. would meath hurlers be capable of getting to an all ireland hurling semi final v tipperary or limerick again no is the answer, meath footballers did this with an average enough team in 2007 and 2009. hurling is a lot harder to make progress in so we really are probably better off trying to get our football teams better than chasing hurling success

dickie10 (UK) - Posts: 693 - 29/04/2024 15:51:47    2541543

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Replying To dickie10:  "hard to know where meath hurling goes but probably has to get players buying in instead of whinging to the county board, at the end of the day its very hard to make the case that meath football is as bad as meath hurling when the operate in different levels. meath footballers are mid table div 2 team , meath hurlers struggle to dtay in div 3 and are usually div 4. meath hurlers getting hockeyed in tier 2 competition, where meath footballers won theirs. id say until we see meath footballers in div 4 of league then you cant really say were as weak in football as hurling. i suppose the starkest statement is if county board put their full effort into hurling would meath u20 hurlers reach a leinster final or win one? the answer would be no. would meath hurlers be capable of getting to an all ireland hurling semi final v tipperary or limerick again no is the answer, meath footballers did this with an average enough team in 2007 and 2009. hurling is a lot harder to make progress in so we really are probably better off trying to get our football teams better than chasing hurling success"
Just to put some stats to the previous posts. Going on National League finishing positions, Meath Footballers finished 13th while the Hurlers finished 18th so there is hardly a world of difference. Now when Meath footballers were at the top the hurlers were also ranked much higher than they are now. My guess is that they would have been an average of 5 or 6 places behind the footballers. In other words when one code was doing well the other was also doing well. Success breeds success.
Following the Christy Ring Cup success in 2016 (it was then the second tier Hurling Championship) the hurlers would have ranked favorably with the footballers. That year there were very few defections from the team like this year and apart from coughing up 2 goals to Paddy Purcell, yes that man again, in the Laois game they beat Kerry and lost by a point or two to Westmeath. Again there were very few defectors from the previous year's team unlike last year's Ring Cup ( now 3rd tier) when there were a massive amount of players unavailable for this year.
The 2016 team though showed massive heart and won it eventually in extremely difficult circumstances. There is no reason with the amount of players playing the game here in Meath that we can't aspire to rise again.

MillerX (Meath) - Posts: 1066 - 29/04/2024 21:34:10    2541625

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