Wexford GAA 2013

Do the Hurlers play next week? Who & where if yes?

Spratt said that he’s away. He did not go into any more depth on this.

Yes, away to Limerick.

Away to Limerick next Sunday, as far as I know.

I conceded promotion weeks ago when I realised the extent of our injury problems. We can’t afford to be without 5 or 6 starters, unfortunately. We need to get them back as soon as possible and we’ll certainly defeat Dublin in the championship in Wexford Park. I don’t think there’s any doubt about this.

FT: Wexford 2-16 Limerick 1-19.

A bit of pride restored despite Limerick playing a lot of back up players.

We were 4 or 5 points down late on before Garrett Sinnott scored a goal to bring us back into it.

The gap was 2 when Eoin Quigley (according to Spratt) touched in a free in the last minute.

They equalised then in injury time.

What kind of Wexford team was that bandage? A very second string Limerick side today, expected Wexford to win if they were anywhere near full strength. Though nothing really to play for today for either team.

It was pretty much our best available team but our problem is that we’re missing several players through injury and other reasons. We could do with having the experience of Keith Rossiter and Diarmuid Lyng around - it’s hard for young players to immediately adapt to inter-county when there’s a chunk of them pitched in together and we could do with having more established players available.

Rossiter had a shoulder problem that has kept him out since Oulart got beaten by Kilcormac-Killoughey in November/December and apparently strained his hamstring on his return to action with the club recently. Lyng was ruled out of the league with an illness and I’m not sure if he’s going to return in time for the championship.

Other unavailable players include Matthew O’Hanlon - he’s only 21 or 22 but has been our full back for the last couple of years, he’s studying abroad this year and isn’t involved with the panel.

Eoin Moore is a pretty good corner back and was progressing well until suffering a set back earlier in the league - I’m not sure what his injury is but he’s missed the last few games.

Jack Guiney has a neck injury and I don’t think he’s played in the league (maybe in 1 game at most) - again, he’s a young player but featured in attack last year and did well in the championship against Cork in particular.

We have a few other promising young players that aren’t involved this year having been on the panel last season, like St Anne’s duo Diarmuid O’Keeffe and Liam McGovern. The former is doing the summer J1 thing so didn’t commit this season (he captained our U21 footballers the other night) and the latter needs a hip operation but I think is travelling for the summer too.

A few others have been in and out with niggly injuries too such as PJ Nolan and we can’t really afford to be without that many. We’re quite fortunate that Andrew Shore and Lee Chin have come on board after committing fully to football last year; otherwise we’d be fairly low on numbers.

Rossiter and Moore would strengthen the defence but I worry about our half forward line options. We seemed to have David Redmond and Lee Chin playing there today and they are more comfortable playing in midfield or half back. Getting Lyng back at left half forward would be a boost - Rory Jacob and Paul Morris are hurling well in the full forward line but we’ll need to get enough possession into them.

Cheers for that bandage. I’m delighted you have recovered from your lost interest in Wexford gaa. That’s a lot of players to manage without and teams like Limerick and Wexford can’t handle those losses. This league structure that keeps Wexford and ourselves down at a lower level really grinds my gears.

I think this is a reasonable league structure with the paltry number of teams that are able to play stick stick at even a moderate level. Every so often teams like Antrim, Carlow, Westmeath or Laois become reasonably competitive but not often enough to have two 8 team divisions.

Yeah, we just don’t have the depth at the moment to handle being without that many. That said, the performance last weekend in getting trounced at home by Dublin was still unacceptable by all accounts. You seem to be building fairly well though I noted dodgy saying that you’ll probably be reliant on a core 20 or so.

I was chatting to a recently retired Wexford player a couple of weeks ago about our young/emerging players and he reckons that the players coming through in Wexford are significantly better than his vintage which would have won back to back Leinster Under 21 titles (Limerick beat us in 1 of the AI finals as part of your 3 in a row).

I found that fairly interesting but we’re yet to see that being reflected on the pitch at senior level. Of course, the problem (if that’s the right term to use) is that other counties have also improved significantly so we’re still behind them - for example, we haven’t won a Leinster minor in nearly 30 years!

I have been very excited the last few years at some of the Limerick players coming through, better than we’ve had in a long time. But then you look around and arguably other counties have as good or better coming through too… Alot of counties are improving rapidly at the moment. This league structure is seriously hampering the resurgence of Offaly and Wexford in particular though I think, it’s a disgrace. I’d be very happy if Limerick had 20 players good enough to call on by the way, I think we have developed a little bit more depth than last season already this year, if we can avoid injuries.

Lack of decent hurlers and brutal underage teams (esp at colleges level) holding back Offaly

I don’t know if you are trolling or something, Offaly have been worthless underage for the past decade. But I suppose a 6 team league is to blame for that as well.

No I’m not trolling. Look, resigning teams to being stuck in a lower division is bad for hurling in those counties. The game gets a lower profile, people lose interest, and it makes it a harder task to bridge the gap to the top. I think the commentators cheerleading about the “success” of this league because it has been so “competitive” are idiots. Of course it will be competitive when half the teams go to semis and one third into a relegation play off!

The Wexford football team for Sunday’s game against Laois has been announced:

Masterson,
Wadding, Molloy, Furlong,
Malone, Murphy, Chin,
Waters, Quinlivan,
Holmes, Barry, Banville,
Roche, Lyng, Brosnan.

This would be Lyng’s for start of the season after his injury and Adrian Flynn is listed in the subs. We’ve never been able to get the forward mix right when we’ve included all 4 of Banville, Roche, Lyng and Brosnan.

1-1 here in a very windy fortress Wexford park. We’re against it for first half. Team as selected

4-2 down. Couple of silly mistakes out the field cost some scores. Murphy and PJ have been booked already because they conceded 3 frees. None of them bad challenges. Tierney started for Furlong too. Pretty harmless game so far, there for the taking.

Awful shit. 9-2 down. This ain’t going well at all. Laois had what I tthought a blatant penalty not given. Flynn on for Holmes and fucks up with his first touch and they go down and score, 10-2. Twitter tells me Armagh are winning well, and longford are doing us aa favour beating louth.

Red scores a penalty, 5 mins into second half. 1-3 to 11

This fucking game, the ref and Wexford are really infuriating me. Still 1-3 to 11. Furlong Carty and Byrne on for tierney Quinlivan and Ben.