Mayo donāt have the bottle to win an all Ireland. I think the main contenders outside of Dublin are going to come north of the border. The competition in ulster looks the strongest of all the provinces. Leinster is pretty weak. A lot of the sides wonāt be able to live with Dublin once they get going. In Munster there is only going to be either cork or Kerry and this year Kerry are looking weak. Connaught is similar to Leinster in that they have one really dominant team but I feel the other teams are better than any of the other teams in Connaught.
I think it will be a Leinster/ulster all Ireland final.
I still have my doubts about him but I will agree that he has improved. I was looking at him soloing the ball yesterday and you could see the improvement when he soloād the ball it wasnāt ending up around his head. He must have done some amount of work on the basic skills.
[QUOTE=ātazdedub, post: 938125, member: 312ā]Mayo donāt have the bottle to win an all Ireland. I think the main contenders outside of Dublin are going to come north of the border. The competition in ulster looks the strongest of all the provinces. Leinster is pretty weak. A lot of the sides wonāt be able to live with Dublin once they get going. In Munster there is only going to be either cork or Kerry and this year Kerry are looking weak. Connaught is similar to Leinster in that they have one really dominant team but I feel the other teams are better than any of the other teams in Connaught.
I think it will be a Leinster/ulster all Ireland final.[/QUOTE]
So youāve narrowed the AI finalists down to 1 from 12 v 1 from 9.
I cant decide on who from ulster will get there. Donegal, Monaghan, Tyrone, Derry all look strong and should account for most of the teams in qualifiers. I will stick my neck out and go for a Dublin/Tyrone final thatās if they donāt meet before the final.
[QUOTE=ātazdedub, post: 938125, member: 312ā]Mayo donāt have the bottle to win an all Ireland. I think the main contenders outside of Dublin are going to come north of the border. The competition in ulster looks the strongest of all the provinces. Leinster is pretty weak. A lot of the sides wonāt be able to live with Dublin once they get going. In Munster there is only going to be either cork or Kerry and this year Kerry are looking weak. Connaught is similar to Leinster in that they have one really dominant team but I feel the other teams are better than any of the other teams in Connaught.
I think it will be a Leinster/ulster all Ireland final.[/QUOTE]
ulster is only so hard to call this year due to there being no stand out team ā¦the likes of Donegal and Tyrone have gone back and the likes of Monaghan and Derry have improvedā¦still think Mayo are ahead of any of themā¦
Tyrone and Monaghan look the pick of Ulster to me and i would expect both to have big years and will be as much of a threat as anyone to Dublin. Derry were atrocious yesterady but Dublin have been brought to the boil slowly this year and yesterday no other team would have lived with them i think. Also Derry have not been under that sort of spotlight in sometime and were no doubt overrawed by the occasion. They are no doubt better than that and will be spurred on to prove as much in the championship. Their best player Lynch was totally nullified by Cooper yesterday which was surprising but heās better than that display and so are Derry. I still maintain they could do with Eoin Bradley however in the team. Theyāre behind Tyrone and Monaghan in Ulster no question but for me Ulster looks very strong right now and that is where the challenge to Dublin will come from, not Cork, Kerry, Mayo etc.
Where have Tyrone gone back from? 5 years ago? Next seasons div 1 will have 4 Ulster teams in it. The thing that makes Ulster so tough is that itās all on the day, 7 of the teams are capable of beating the other team and there are no easy games. I would only consider Tyrone or Monaghan as having a genuine shot at the All Ireland although the other teams are well capable of making the quarters.
If Ulster teams were kept apart in the qualifiers I would expect to see 4 of them in the last 8.
[QUOTE=āIl Bomber Destro, post: 938144, member: 2533ā]Where have Tyrone gone back from? 5 years ago? Next seasons div 1 will have 4 Ulster teams in it. The thing that makes Ulster so tough is that itās all on the day, 7 of the teams are capable of beating the other team and there are no easy games. I would only consider Tyrone or Monaghan as having a genuine shot at the All Ireland although the other teams are well capable of making the quarters.
If Ulster teams were kept apart in the qualifiers I would expect to see 4 of them in the last 8.[/QUOTE]
we werenāt talking about whoād make the last 8 FFSā¦we were talking about teams to challenge Dublin and I still see Mayo ahead of everyone elseā¦
Got to agree with the lads above, the main threat to Dublin is going to come out ulster this year. For me mayo havenāt progressed their team, they have hardly any new players to give them that extra bit needed to get over the line.
You said there were no standout team in Ulster this year and thatās why itās hard to call. 4 Ulster teams will make up 4 of the 8 teams in Division 1, last year 4 Ulster teams made it to the All Ireland quarters. Ulster is hard to call as it has a lot of really strong teams and as Iāve already stated Tyrone and Monaghan are definitely genuine contenders for the All Ireland. In Leinster you have Dublin way out there on their own. In Munster Cork and Kerry only really have to beat each other, in Connacht Mayo will stroll to another provincial championship. Dublin are out there on their own at the minute, the chasing pack are pretty evenly matched. I donāt see Mayo being back for a third All Ireland final in a row, there problems in the forward line are still abundantly clear as before.
For Tyrone to win Ulster this year they will have to beat Down, Monaghan, Cavan/Armagh and Derry/Donegal. All these teams are more than capable of beating each other on the day and if you threw Mayo/Cork/Kerry in there then there is still no standout team as you would put it.
Yes I didā¦and you rated it ādumbāā¦think Roscommon and longford winning in Ulster proves my pointā¦and as for that shit served up in omagh parkā¦
Iām not surprised Roscommon won. Iāve said from the outset that Cavan are a dreadful team. Derry seemed to pack it in after they lost to Donegal with lads walking off the panel, others leaving for the States and players picking up injuries lining out for their clubs a week before a county match.
Down were a disappointment yesterday but there was a point in it with 10 minutes to go and they seemed to be on the wrong end of refereeing decisions at that juncture.
Armagh have improved massively this year and style wise they are all wrong for Tyrone who have looked pretty clueless in dealing with blanket defences over the past 4 years.
[QUOTE=āIl Bomber Destro, post: 983325, member: 2533ā]Iām not surprised Roscommon won. Iāve said from the outset that Cavan are a dreadful team. Derry seemed to pack it in after they lost to Donegal with lads walking off the panel, others leaving for the States and players picking up injuries lining out for their clubs a week before a county match.
Down were a disappointment yesterday but there was a point in it with 10 minutes to go and they seemed to be on the wrong end of refereeing decisions at that juncture.
Armagh have improved massively this year and style wise they are all wrong for Tyrone who have looked pretty clueless in dealing with blanket defences over the past 4 years.[/QUOTE]
do you think Tyrone have the players to really challenge?..from what Iāve seen of them I donāt think they have enough qualityā¦
Yes. I would lay the blame at the hands of management. The level we have played at this year in contrast to last is staggering. The team havenāt play with any cohesion, it just seems to be different players stepping up in different games trying to drag us to victory.
thought they were poor against Down in Omagh, poor against Monaghan and again yesterdayā¦only against down in newry did the look goodā¦and you saw what Kildare done to them in newry and what Meath did to kildareā¦
Yes. They have been poor all year round. Maybe it was naivety or hope but I felt as the year went on they would click as a team. Think I was reading that Harte has used 30+ players in the Championship this season. He couldnāt settle on a fixed team, he couldnāt get the players to gel and he seems to be badly managing the talent coming through. The problem is not the quality of the players but the lack of settled team and absence of a game plan.