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Just in response to theman. You say Clara are lucky to be in the Junior B Final. They played the semi final twice and won it twice. Lucky???

In the Senior I cannot see past Rhode. Its not as simple as stopping Niall anymore. He was fairly quiet against Clara yet Rhode won comfortably. Rhode are defending in numbers and attacking at pace. Very hard to get a handle on that. Edenderry will hope for a horrible wet day like 2011 but its Rhode by 6+ for me.

Abercrombie Fitch wrote:Just in response to theman. You say Clara are lucky to be in the Junior B Final. They played the semi final twice and won it twice. Lucky???

Well in one sense they are lucky as if Durrow hadn't of offered a replay they wouldn't be in the Final. But thats excluding the point. What I meant was lucky as in they had some results go their way in the group stage with walk overs etc. But also seen them in action and they were poor enough in the group. But like any team they can only improve as the championship wears on. No offence intended to Clara.

Ah fair enough.

'Twas the night before the county final and not a sound!! Ah here it goes , Rhode 2-13 Edenderry 1-09. Hope it's closer and a good game , we need a good old fashioned dog fight with two bitter rivals.

Niall mc way past he's best(today will prove it) anton won't score more than 2/3 points (today will prove it) Alan mc hasn't the legs rigney is dodgy (today will prove it).Edenderry have a fit young team who attack in droves.get the ball in fast to the full forward and they will score.if Dalton fit it's the reds year by 5(watch this space)

mickey wrote:Niall mc way past he's best(today will prove it) anton won't score more than 2/3 points (today will prove it) Alan mc hasn't the legs rigney is dodgy (today will prove it).Edenderry have a fit young team who attack in droves.get the ball in fast to the full forward and they will score.if Dalton fit it's the reds year by 5(watch this space)

think you will have to revise your thoughts Mickey.....Thought Niall was a class apart today and scored a lot - at least 5 points despite huge number of wides for him......maybe 5......looked at his ease and on different level......Anton Sullivan didnt give Pender a sniff today.....Dalton may have been struggling with injury but never really caught a ball and rhode mopped up the breaks.......way hungrier and way more purpose going forward.....

Edenderry 2 corner forwards did well enough but little or no support from other forwards..... Thought Kelly looked good at times but held on to ball too long at times and Rhode defence had time to get back and close off the space.....Rigney did great job at Full back and Rhode were in control throughout!!!

Edenderry never attacked in droves.....it was like they played the game in fear and never realy went for it....

Really bad match today.Rhode were miles better than Edenderry and should have giving them a much bigger beating.Niall McNamee was about the only footballer who looked close to inter county standard and even then he kicked a bucket load of wides on top of the or 6 points he score.

Great win for Daingean today and an unbelievable score to clinch it in the last minute.

Alan mc mopped up ball in midfield and it looked like Edenderry were afraid to tackle him. Kelly came into the game in bits in the second half. Niall scored some sweet points , the one in the first half with the outside of the boot was class. McPadden roasted the Byrne lad and how he was left on him I don't know. Rhode should have won this game by 10 points , bad wides and wrong decisions could have cost them again better opposition. Hanlon could have been sent off again and was poor today , Dalton was at nothing and why he ran into full forward at the start I don't know. Edenderrys full back was taken off after 10 mins which wasn't a good sign. At the end of the day Niall and Alan Mc are still two of the best players in the county and have yet again won a county title and how anyone can say otherwise is beyond me. This final wasn't like two years ago where Edenderry caught Clara on the hop and if they ran into Rhode in 2011 I don't think they would have beaten them either .

Great win for Daingean well done and fair play , if ever a team deserved to win juniorA it's Daingean. At least in this game there was a bit of life , the senior game lacked a bite big time.

mickey wrote:Niall mc way past he's best(today will prove it) anton won't score more than 2/3 points (today will prove it) Alan mc hasn't the legs rigney is dodgy (today will prove it).Edenderry have a fit young team who attack in droves.get the ball in fast to the full forward and they will score.if Dalton fit it's the reds year by 5(watch this space)

the Rhode lads must have seen what you wrote Mickey everyone you said that would be poor played well Niall Mac, kicked 7 points should have scored 10, fair play to Rhode the are a great little village and have won some amount of county title's, not much talk about them doing well in the leinster club this year, but with a low profile this could be the year they do it.

Although there was a good crowd in Oconner park there just wasn't the atmosphere that you would expect with the occasion of a county final day , mainly due to the fact the spectators weren't given much too shout about , no shoulder or statement of intent was put down early in the game , a big difference to how things used to be when these two met back in the 90s .

Rhode wont worry to much about this and fair play to them they got the job they were asked to do done today.

Edenderrys tack-tick of launching the ball high and long throught out the match puzzled me , Rigney was well on top at full back and Edenderry played right into Rhodes hands when they did this allowing them to play out from the back, they must have kicked away 8 or 9 possessions by doing this rather than trying to find a man in space , or a least kicking the ball into space.

Rhode looked comfortable through and are deserving winners .

The intermediate final was a very exciting game of football but the raheen men must be sick as they left it behind them. They should of had Shamrocks dead and buried but kept allowing them to come back into the game , the turning point of the game was in the second half when raheen rattled the very bottom of the crossbar which would have insured victory and shamrocks went straight down the field and got a goal of there own. Raheen had a chance to win it at the very end with a kickable free but it looks like pressure got to the kicker and he never connected with the shot.

The junior final was also an exciting game , although if you wernt at it the statistics they would suggest otherwise . I tough the referee was very quick to hand out yellow cards in a game that there was no dirt in, and hes inconsistency through out was frustrating for both sets of fans.

Daingean had the lions share of possession but found scores very hard to come by but when the game was in the melting pot they were the team who stood up and were counted .

Victory will be tough to take for the clonbollogue team and as daingean learned Junior is a difficult nut to crack, especially when expectation is hight that you will climb back out of it , hopefully they wont be in the doldrums for too long as they are a proud club.

I wonder did pat Flanagan see any of these games ? .. Unfortunately I cant imagine to many players who havnt been already tried and tested left a lasting impression

Pat Flanagan was at the game and was also interviewed on the television before the game

Edenderry were shocken bad.if that's the 2nd best team in offal than god help us.looked like those had 2 more gears in them.sorry guys got this one completely wrong

McNamee leads way as driven Rhode block out Edenderry
Rhode 0-13 Edenderry 1-7 - Offaly SFC final
Brian Lowry

Paul McPadden and Niall McNamee hit 10 points between them as Rhode kicked on from a two-point half-time lead to blitz Edenderry at the start of the second half when they pushed 0-11 to 0-4 clear.

Edenderry refused to give in but couldn't get close enough to their opponents, with their prospects dealt a major blow following the loss of captain Richie Dalton to a black card midway through the second half.

While Rhode controlled the majority of the game, their performance was far from flawless.

They racked up eight first-half wides and should really have held more than that two-point cushion at the break, while they only registered two points in the closing 19 minutes.

McNamee showed up well throughout but he will be disappointed not to have put more than seven points on the board. With new Offaly manager in waiting Pat Flanagan in attendance, the Clara man would have left with plenty of food for thought and also with the knowledge that Rhode are still the dominant force in Faithful county football.

The first half failed to catch fire, with both sides making plenty of errors in attack.

Despite opening the scoring through Derek Kelly in the fourth minute, Edenderry were playing second fiddle and four points from McNamee inside the opening quarter helped the Rhode men into a 0-5 to 0-2 lead.

McNamee's third point in the 13th minute of the game, when he shook off marker Sean Marshall and drilled over with the outside of the boot, was one of the highlights of the contest.

Edenderry hit their first point from play in the 21st minute through substitute Adam Mahon while at the other end McNamee and Co were racking up the wides.

Niall Darby stopped the rot for Rhode with a point in the 25th minute but the game was still very much in the balance at 0-6 to 0-4 as the teams went in at the break.

Rhode got a whirlwind start to the second half, kicking five points on the spin in the opening six minutes when efforts from McNamee and McPadden might easily have been struck to the net rather than over the bar.

Scramble

Both McNamee and McPadden kicked a brace each before Darby was on hand to tidy up a goalmouth scramble and fist over.

At 0-11 to 0-4, the game looked dead and buried but Edenderry substitute Mark Young rose highest to fist a Sean Doyle free to the net on 46 minutes to give Peter Brady's charges something to fight for in the closing 15 minutes.

With Dalton off the pitch, Edenderry continued to battle on but McNamee and McPadden were on target again to leave it 0-13 to 1-5 with five minutes remaining.

Edenderry pressed hard but the Rhode defence held strong, with the outstanding Eoin Rigney and Brian Darby to the fore.

Edenderry tagged on a few late frees but Rhode held on to move just one behind Tullamore in the Dowling Cup roll of honour as they advance to yet another tilt at a Leinster title.

Their provincial campaign begins against Louth champions St Patrick's in two weeks' time.

Winning manager Pat Daly believes his side can go well in the Leinster championship.

"The boys have had runs at Leinster before, we've left a few behind. People say that we don't look at it, but we have one eye on it," he said.

"I know it's going to be a tough game because Pat's will be incredibly motivated."

Scorers: Rhode: N McNamee 0-7 (3fs), P McPadden 0-3, N Darby 0-2, A Sullivan 0-1. Edenderry: M Young 1-0, D Kelly 0-3 (2fs), S Doyle 0-2 (1f), A Mahon and S Moriarty (45) 0-1 each.

Rhode: K Garry; J Kavanagh, E Rigney, J McPadden; C Heavey, B Darby, E Byrne; A McNamee, C McNamee; D Garry, P Sullivan, N Darby; P McPadden, A Sullivan, N McNamee. Subs: G O'Connell for D Garry (24), R McNamee for P McPadden (60).

Edenderry: B Quinlan; S Marshall, S Pender, C Byrne; D Hanlon, S Guing, S Cullen; R Dalton, D Kelly; K McGuinness, C Hurley, B Malone; S Moriarty, A McDonnell, S Doyle. Subs: A Mahon for Marshall (15), M Young for Malone (38), O Lawton for Dalton (42, BC), C Farrell for Hurley (50), D Nolan for McGuinness (53).

Referee: D Brazil (Shannonbridge).

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