Galway GAA Discussion Thread #2

I get the point on the tactics, not that Armagh were the better team. Galway had the chances to win the game. They just couldn't finish their dinner. Normally Galway shooting is better than that.

https://www.bbc.com/sport/articles/c0vejxz8rr2o

From the article above -

"Galway ended the game with 13 points from 25 shots (nine wides, three dropped short), their profligacy dashing their hopes of ending a 23-year wait for Sam."

Very well summed up

The talk here about positives and the future is mental. Need to face the reality first. This was the worst All Ireland loss bar the 83 final when 14 lost to 12 dubs.

Armagh only scored 1-11 FFS. They had 0-9 points after 42 mins. They still outscored Galway in the next 35 minutes, it's criminal.

Conroy made up for his quiet game 2 years ago. I feel so sorry for him. 3 points from midfield in a final . He deserved more from Comer and Walsh.

Comer is our Aidan O Shea. A flat track bully in Connacht.

Absolute **** bottlers.

I don't think you can blame Comer, no forward could operate in the position he did today. Hidden behind 2 lines of defence, no chance of ball coming in. Clifford operated in less confined circumstances 2 weeks ago and got no where.

You have to run at blanket defences and have runners to offload to running in support. Pass the parcel from side to side will only get so far. It works in soccer as the ball can be transferred so quickly. In football it takes 2 to 3 times as long and it's easily covered. The only joy we got in the first half was when mcHugh cut in and took them on. We got 3 or 4pts off just him.

Walsh is a good ball carrier too and he should have made similar runs to draw defenders. Bring Comer out to run support from deep and he would draw defenders or fouls. We'd get plenty of point and goal chances. Might get turned over the odd time but it's risk reward and we're risk adverse.

Joyce possibly should have held comer in reserve. He was poor enough against the dubs and donegal if we are being honest. Yesterday will sting Galway for a long long time. Armagh didnt even play well yesterday and Galway just malfunctioned. Still can't belive they butchered the overlap when gleeson broke the kickout in injury time. I cant see an all Ireland going to galway for a long long time given the teams that will reemerge next year. Yesterday was the chance.

In hindsight, losing Finnerty was a huge loss and maybe cost them the game. He surely would have offered a little more danger, and landed one or two of those frees.

But I really didn't see that performance coming from Galway. I know that the Armagh defence is of course very tight, and they generally don't concede high scores.

But Comer, Walsh, Heaney, Tierney, all underperformed IMO, Finnerty was injured and McDaid was quiet by his standards. Even McHugh's accuracy deserted him.

Galway had enough chances to win the game. I don't think armagh were the better team.

Leave off! We beat our closest rivals in Connacht, the league champions, and (in knock-out games in very tight finishes) the Leinster and Ulster champions en route. Nothing shabby or weak about that.

We made hard work of every single score we got bar the McDaid one on the break. Armagh manufactured their scores more easily. Just having possession doesn't make you the better team. Armagh pressure caused some of those misses and they had misses of their own, unless you think we should score everything we kick.

Agreed. Anyone talking about possession doesn't get how the Armagh and Galway systems work. They are counter-attacking teams. They draw bodies in, crowd them out, get a turnover and break up the field into space. The opposition are regularly going to have more possession in games. In fact, Id argue the fact that galway had more possession shows that they changed their style a bit and played into Armagh's hands. I see 9 pundits out of 9 picked galway to win in one paper - did this sort of thing have an effect on how they approached the game?

Galway's conservative approach stopped them from getting up the field at pace, which in turn was the reason why guys had to take on those longer shots under pressure that they subsequently missed. Short kickout after short kickout, when galway were bossing the skies on the armagh kickout underlines this further. This was the way to attack armagh from a galway perspective, but they shied away from it. I have heard a lot of galway fans lionising joyce post-match and blaming the players, but his decisions on the sideline created the situation on the field. The same fans lament finnerty going off, but they dont stop to consider who came on for him - heaney! Good player in his own right, but a goto inside forward he isnt. When you consider those hail-mary points that conroy kicked on top of their misses, it really underlines how galway were struggling to get normal scores. This was happening because they were too conservative, and that ethos came from the sideline. Armagh moved the ball more quickly and with more purpose when they attacked - that was really the only difference between the two teams.

Any team who gets into a defensive formation, with extra bodies playing zonally around their goals is setting up to crowd out and counter attack the opposition. That is how a counter attack works.

Armagh had 15 players defending inside their 45 for the entire game. When people criticise Galway for being conservative there was very little space to attack into. You can't just kick ball into a blanket defence. The defence will come away with it 9 times out of 10. The only time there was space was when Galway turned them over and then you could see they tried to move the ball very quickly. Sometimes they got scores from this but on a couple other occasions they messed up their transition. Like when they got the ball up to Silke and he probably could have taken the score himself but he turned back to give it back to Walsh who blazed his shot wide.

But this is a basic thing. How on earth do teams not prepare for the scenario where player A, B or C is injured?

Surely there should have been a free taker on the bench ready to come on if Finnerty was injured or tired? In the whole of Galway, there's only one consistent free-taker? Bizarre. And it's not just Galway that has this problem. Typical GAA team preparation for games, ah shur we only have one free-taker and if he gets injured, we'll just wing it. Simple stuff that eludes the average inter county manager.

Mayo are as bad, no left footed free taker.

They did but context is everything, that will be forgotten in years to come though. Can you honestly see Armagh dominating? Everything fell right for them after Ulster this year. The chances of that happening again is remote.

In Ulster -

Beat Fermanagh by 11

Beat Down by 1

Lost to Donegal on penalties

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Group Stage -

Beat Westmeath by 5

Beat Derry by 11

Drew with Galway

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QF - Beat Roscommon by 6

SF - Beat Kerry by 2 AET

F - beat Galway by 1

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I suppose you can say that if Galway did not inexplicably throw away that drawn group game, which Galway dominated. - Armagh would not have topped the group stage and got that nice QF draw v Roscommon.

Who knows who Galway would have met after that as the permutations would be different? And Armagh would have faced a prelim QF.