Liam was sprung from nowhere in the 2016 AI semi replay I think. Dropped off the panel for a few years but had a good club championship last year and was recalled.
Kevin called up for the first time this year. Iād say 27/28. One of the new breed of IC debutants closer to 30 than 20.
Jason Flynn at least has the best point in an AI final to go back on. 2015 I think.
Billy is a bit of a pound shop bully vs the weaker leinster teams scoring well. Never does it vs the better teams. He does put in a big shift off the ball though
They had a good 4 decades tbf
Iām a little bit surprised by that team. I thought theyād want to give close to the starting 15 a run out.
Despite his pace, he regularly gets cleaned closer to goal. Itās probably a working half-forward role or nowhere at this stage.
David 23, Kevin 25, Liam 27.
They didnāt stand out for me last year.
Billy had a fantastic game in the 2021 all Ireland semi against cork. Think he scored 5 from play marking rob downey who was obviously very callow then and no relation to the player he is now.
Rob is also not related to a 3. A very underrated half back however.
The much-maligned Rob Downey was excellent in normal time in that game but was roasted in ET if i remember correctly. I thought he was marking TJ Reid for a lot of it.
Other way around. He was poor in the first half on Billy Ryan. Good second half though and was excellent in ET.
For some reason Kilkenny kept TJ inside for extra time which suited Downey a lot more than the more energetic Billy Ryan.
Kilkenny kept lumping aimless ball into TJ and Downey absolutely cleaned up. That cameo from Downey proved fatal to their All Ireland bid as it seemed to convince the Cork management they now had a full back line that could go man to man with the Limerick full forward line.
The problem was more out the field in my view and the fb line were hung out to dry. If you allow DOD, Lynch, Hayes, Byrnes, Hannon loads of time to find the full forward line, youāre dead and buried.
It doesnāt matter how deep your half backline are (Cork decided to leave 50 yards of space in front of the fb line that day), Limerick are so good at ball in hand and delivery to the ff line that they relish teams looking to play sweepers.
I am convinced that to beat Limerick, you have to push up aggressively for the entire duration of the game with zero let up and allow Byrnes, Hayes, Hannon etc. very little time on the ball.
Easier said than done. As well as being extremely fit, you also need to be built like a brick wall. That kind of strength doesnāt come by just strolling up to the gym in winter months. The current Limerick crop and even the younger ones such as English, OāConnor etc have been working on strength and conditioning for years. I canāt remember who said it after the All Ireland but he made the point that every collision with a Limerick player takes at least 20 seconds out of your game. He was spot on. Kilkenny were dead on their feet by the 60th minute. Had the game gone on another ten minutes, they were looking at a hiding similar to Cork in 21
Youve the overlapping run of nash coming up past that hb line to defend too. Hes also very adept at either continuing the run and drawing anither defender or playing a good pass
Be interesting to see come championship what methods are employed to contain as you say that ball getting into the ff line
From full back to midfield roughly , they contributed roughly half of Limerickās total tin last years AIF . Breaking even in the middle third of the field isnāt even enough. You have to totally dominate it. Limerick donāt need to be feeding the ff line.
Just watched the U20 footballers blow an 8-point lead to fall over the line by a point to Waterford in the Munster Championship.
Sad to say that Limerick football is not in a good place.
Kilbridge, Neville, and Rigter the only players related to a footballer.
Louis Mulqueen over Adare? Can anybody confirm?
Whatās his club record like @Big_Dan_Campbell @Raylan?
He has a club AI with Doora-Barefield, even if itās going back a while. Galway titles with Mellows more recently, had a year with Blackrock in Cork where they got to the final, and then was with Inagh-Kilnamona here last year but he couldnāt work the oracle there. Far as I know he wanted to stay on but they didnāt renew the option there.
He must have been fair young when coaching Doora/Barefield?
Is he mad for the sweepers?