Where was he critical there? âThe referee applied the correct sanctionâ
Critical of his decision not to send off Coen in 2015.
Thatâs going back a bit. Donât tell me Shefflin made reference to the same thing?
Thatâs an awful effort Bandage
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He criticized his handling of the 2015 All Ireland Final.
Iâd prefer to be formerly windy and AI Champions than currently windy and as far away from it as the past 20+ years.
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Thatâs historical context maybe. Wouldnât strike me as âvery criticalâ in any sense.
Leave him go through his stages of loss, hes at anger now it seems
Resignation Iâd say.
This style is only used against teams with shite defenses.
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Very neat description of Wexford. An abhorrent âstyleâ of route one hoof hurling but incredibly ineffective largely due to their strength and physicality all over the park. How a formerly windy but silkily skillful team have been transformed into a crowd of mashed potato monsters playing a turgid and grinding brand of losing hurling is scary.
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Trust me, if another 7 years pass and weâre nearly 30 years without winning an AI then Iâd gladly accept a title any which way it comes. I totally understand why Galway supporters have no complaints with the ugly but latterly winning hurling on display.
I feel you pain, having endured it for 29 years.
I know youâre acting the bollox but Galwayâs breakthrough isnât due to the preponderance of giants wielding camans that we have inherited. We simply 
solved a few positions where we were never quite right for all those years, fullback and centerback obviously but also a good blend at midfield. Weâve had lots of good players in those positions over the years, but it took finding dominant individuals to get us over the line.
We would have won no AI last year without Daithi shackling Seamie and the second half performances in the same game of Mac and David Burke. Daithi is priceless, if there were transfers allowed in hurling he would be like a Sergio Ramos in his pomp years.
With a few exceptions every winning AI team has a dominant figure at 3 and 6. I know the game has changed but Lohan and McMahon would be just as good in this era, as would countless other combinations over the years. Some might struggle for pace but a great hurling brain can overcome that.
Feel free to use this in one of your future articles. Iâm sure you can flesh it out a bit.
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No wonder youâre failing your driving tests. If the tester instructs you to go from A to B, take the direct route. Scenic routes unnecessarily waste precious resources, surely something an accountant should appreciate.
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You can only do this if you have the men at your disposal. Wexford severely lacking in that department.
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âSome counties are training 28 days out of 30 â itâs madnessâ
Paul Keane investigates whether GAA players are right to complain of being tired after taking part in three games in 20 days
Paul Keane, GAA Reporter
June 5 2018, 12:01am, The Times
Shortly after Wexford had hammered Offaly in their second of four Leinster Hurling Championship games, Davy Fitzgerald outlined his fears about fatigue.
His team had just given a performance that Michael Duignan, the RTĂ pundit, described as one of the most intoxicating that he had witnessed â but Fitzgerald was concerned. Asked about turning things around in seven days before playing Galway, a match that took place last Saturday, Fitzgerald revealed his fears.
âIt depends how fresh we will be, thatâs the thing, we need to be fresh,â the former All-Ireland-winning Clare manager said. âI need to have the guys fresh. Can we do three or four weeks? I donât think we can do four anyway.â
In last Saturdayâs Irish Examiner, hours before the game, Fitzgerald reiterated those concerns. âItâs a big ask for us,â he said. âIâve said it before but the big thing that bothers me is us having to play four weeks in a row.â
Kevin Martin, the Offaly manager, made the same point after his sideâs loss to Dublin on Sunday, their fourth defeat on consecutive weekends, which ensured they would be relegated from the MacCarthy Cup.
âMentally theyâre fatigued, physi-cally theyâre fatigued,â Martin said. âWeâre just not cut out for four weeks in a row.â
There was a similar theme throughout the commentary and analysis of Saturdayâs Munster Championship encounter between Cork and Limerick; that expecting Cork to deliver the goods three weekends in a row was unfair. Cork escaped with a draw but, like Wexford earlier that afternoon, looked leggy and weary for spells, apparently confirming that too much was being asked of them.
âThese guys are amateurs, theyâre not professionals,â Martin said after Offalyâs loss. âSome of them are farmers and electricians, they just donât have the energy levels for that. Itâs not fair on them really.â
Yet havenât we reached an era where elite GAA players are virtually training like professionals? Should their standards dip by such a rate on the third, or in Offalyâs case, fourth weekend of consecutive action? As Conor McManus, the Monaghan footballer, said this year, âItâs just hard to see what more players can do without going professional.â
CiarĂĄn Deely, the London Gaelic football manager who works as a sports scientist at Queens Park Rangers, the Sky Bet Championship soccer club, told The Times that if players are struggling after three games in a row then serious questions need to be answered.
âIf you look at it, a lot of Championship soccer teams are playing Saturday, Tuesday, Saturday, Tuesday and theyâre perfectly able to do it,â Deely said.
âTheyâre obviously professional but weâre constantly hearing that the top GAA players are as fit as professionals. Then they play three weekends in a row and the commentary is of players breaking down and not being able to do it. I donât understand that. It shouldnât be the case if things are properly planned and managed. Thereâs no reason they shouldnât be able to play at a high level consistently over many weekends.â
Perhaps hurling managers have been guilty of talking themselves into a problem, of inflating the issue. Deely suggested another potential explanation. âMy experience with the QPR first team, who go Saturday to Saturday, is that their training is a lot less than the Gaelic teams but thereâs more expertise around it, in terms of peaking, periodisation and training loads,â he said.
âWithin the GAA there are a lot of strength and conditioning guys who are looking to push constantly, to be in the gym and to be running. Thereâs not enough recovery in there.
âI had a really good conversation with Ross Bennett [QPR sports scientist] recently. Weâve got a GPS system from STATSports for the London team and it was really interesting when we looked at the stats and compared them to the QPR academy.
âWe realised that in the GAA world weâre probably obsessed with intensity in everything we do and weâre not spending enough time on skills and tactics. The QPR first team spend an awful lot of time on their passing and low- tempo work, their shape, their defensive structure, corner kicks, free kicks. The GAA world seems to be more obsessed with the high-tempo, high-intensity stuff and it takes its toll.
âI think weâre training hard but not always the smartest. Youâre reading in the papers of counties training 25 and 28 days out of 30. To me, thatâs madness. If you train four times a week, that should be more than adequate to be playing each weekend without breaking down. Itâs disappointing to hear teams complaining about that because ultimately in hurling theyâve got what we all want in the GAA: more games and less training.â
Deely returned from India, where he trained Terry Phelanâs Kerala Blasters team in the Indian Super League, to take the London job in late 2015.
In a previous life, he captained the Wexford footballers and played in the 2008 All-Ireland semi-final defeat by the eventual champions Tyrone.
He believes that the GAA, at county and central level, has been slow to install proper structures around strength and conditioning. Dublin are ahead of the curve with a high- performance manager, Bryan Cullen, but few counties have been as innovative and there is no one at Croke Park taking a lead on the situation, according to Deely.
âIâve said it to people in Croke Park, they need to do more,â he said. âWhy not have a sports science department working out of Croke Park? You can basically have anybody in charge of 30 lads and weâre having all these hip and groin injuries, overload injuries. That shouldnât be happening. Itâs a massive welfare issue.
âThe Premier League and the FA took ownership of all of this in football. They go into every club academy and audit them. How many sports scientists do they have? What are their qualifications? What are their roles? Are clubs monitoring training loads for players, their GPS stats, their heart rate?
âAnd itâs all tied into the categorisation of the clubâs academy. If you fall down on those things your categorisation suffers and thatâs all linked in to funding from the Premier League or FA. At the moment in the GAA there are no guidelines, no necessary structures that are being audited. Croke Park really needs to address that.â
Mixed fortunes
The fortunes of teams that have played three weekends in a row, or more, in the SHC
Leinster
Kilkenny Win, Win, Loss
Wexford Win, Win, Loss
Offaly Loss, Loss, Loss, Loss
Munster
Cork Win, Draw, Draw
Tipperary Loss, Draw, Draw
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Iâd like to record my disappointment with Davy over his comments. Itâs total bullshit.
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Standard Davy-speak. If he was managing the pick of Galway, Tipp and Cork heâd still be talking up the obstacles and pitfalls in his path.
Limerick being the main one.
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Come in out of the sun lad 
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