Offaly football team for next day

[Bord na Mona man]

Any word on that meeting last night?

Yes lads.
I logged on today expecting to see a zoo of activity here in the aftermath of last night.
Not a sausage!
Is it all hush hush?

[TheManFromFerbane]

Its like this lads, I've been involved in a few of these and you can be pretty certain you won't here what’s coming out of it. However I will if I may give you what I think is what the script will kinda look like:

Captain: Well lads, we all know why we're here, things have been going very bad the last couple of games, the results and the performances have been poor, and we are just going through the motions at training. Now there is alot talk about the manager and im sure we'll get to that but we also need to look at ourselves to see whats going wrong. We had a strike and we can't just keep blaming everyone else, we need to look at ourselves.

Influential Player #1: Thats exactly it lads, I mean we all probably have issues about whats going on with the managment and everything but its time we stopped looking for excuses. We need to cop the f**k on with ourselves.

Captain: So does anyone have anything to say???

[silence]

Captain: How about you 'Quiet influential player'

Quiet influential player: [in a soft spoken voice] well yee've said it lads, its very easy to criticise the management the whole time but we haven't won anything since [name the year], under a few different managements. We're the only common link in those years.

Influential player #2: Yeah but some of the shite we've been doing at training is a joke [referance to training 2 weeks ago]. I mean that'll get us no where. We need to [either a) do more ball work b) do more gym work or c) do more fitness training.]

Captain: [in an attempt to make it a team meeting and not just a discussion between 4 lads will ask one of the younger members of the team] So [younger member] what do you think?

Younger Member: [shocked that he has been called upon just regurgitates what has already been said] yeah we need to work harder at training but maybe we need to talk about tactics together

Influential Player #1: Its not our place to talk tactics we should just go out and play what ever style the management decide.

Influential Player #2: Yeah but at the same time we all know that what happened against [last game] was shocking, sure how can you win when he tells you to [reference to one instruction] one minute and then tells you to [reference to another instruction] another minute.

[Dressing room turns into something like a primetime debate]

Captain: Right lads, look this is going to get us no where, I'll have a chat with [manager] and tell him that maybe we should be doing [either a) do more ball work b) do more gym work or c) do more fitness training.] and see what he thinks about starting to use [some decided tactic] but we know ourselves we have to up the intensity at training and start putting in the work.

The meeting will disperse with every player even more convinced of what he already thought before he went in. Intensity and effort at training will soar and players will put in an extra effort in the next few games. But if the results don't come their way the manager will be given the boot at the end of the year and more than likely [quietly influential player] will retire citing commitment as the reason but more than likely he’s just sick of those f**kin team meetings!

I've been involved in a few, both county and club, from about u-16 onwards. And I've had great laughs with lads from other clubs and from other counties going though the above script as the same thing happens with all over the country! Its as GAA as the hang sangwhich at half time on the hill but they generally only serve as a temporary boost and make no real decisions.

Hope this helps!!

[Hyper]

TMFF, are you sure you weren't at the meeting. From what I gather you are spot on though there was management input as well on Wednesday night. Hopefully they will come out firing on Sunday with great balls of fire in their bellies..........Also the lads might be a bit sharper as they seemed to have been a bit leg heavy in Parnell Park on Saturday night.
Barry Mooney is out for at least six months - dislocated shoulder.

[Lone Shark]

To get back to the original topic at hand, I see that we have Ger Raff in for Barry Mooney, and that's it. One enforced change.

If I was some of the panellists I'd be feeling a bit hard done by round about now.

[Ron]

What other changes would you make LS? The problem in my view was that we were too slow to react when changes were needed. Mooney is a big loss and our backs will have their work cut out for them.

I agree with an earlier post, it would be interesting to see how Sean Ryan would do if introduced in the second half, he would bring plenty of pace to the game, something Shaper seems to be misssing big time this year.

Ball into the forwards needs to be quicker and better if we're to have any chance. I've no problem with slowing up the ball when we're in defence but the whole tempo should be upped when we're on the attack. And we need to take our frees.

[Lone Shark]

I think that dropping a few of the established names and giving other lads a chance would shake things up a bit. In a game like this where nothing is expected, it could be the time when a few guys might surprise you. It also might galvanise a few other players into action.

As was mentioned earlier, I'd call in maybe Kiely, certainly Guinan and Ryan, and have a few others on the bench.

Certainly Roy Malone should be back on the panel too.

But we'll see a lot more on Sunday.

[seamroga]

I've thought about this for a good while and I wouldn't like to be the man picking the team for Sunday. It wouldn't be as bad if we were at full strength - I'd have Shane Sullivan for Grennan and Barry Mooney for Kellaghan, with Coughlan going centre forward.
I actually can't believe I've put Kellaghan on the team, but I think against Tyrone we need Coughlan's pace and strength on the back line and with that in mind I don't know who else could line out at centre forward. Has anyone any ideas?
I'd start Colm Quinn because we can't afford to miss easy frees from the right hand side. I agree come the summer he'd be better as an impact sub, but what impact could he possibly make on Sunday if we're nine or ten points down with 20 minutes to go.
I think Sean Ryan deserves a better chance than what's he has got so far.
Padraic Kelly,
Ger Rafferty, Sean Casey, Nigel Grennan;
Neville Coughlan, Scott Brady, Karol Slattery;
Alan McNamee, Ciaran McManus;
Sean Ryan, Pascal Kellaghan, Colm Quinn,
James Coughlan, Niall McNamee, Thomas Deehan.