Armagh vs UUJ - 16th January 2010

[Bainisteoir]

Armagh will kick off their season again University side UUJ on Saturday 16th January 2010 in Oliver Plunkett Park, Crossmaglen at 2pm. It'll be Paddy O'Rourke's first competitive game in charge of the Orchard County. It will give him an opportunity to try out some of the new lads on the panel. A large attendance is expected at the game but it has yet to get the go ahead and their will be a pitch inspection so keep an eye on here for updates.

[Bainisteoir]

Posted by Gar on OrchardCounty and I couldn't have put it better myself. Agree 100% with his post

Just in from the game and was disappointed by the result and the perfomance of some of the lads. Overall the uuj were sharper and had good performers in Peter Hughes number 12 Jason Mc Anulla 13 and Daren hughes Midfield. In the first half he was immense. With number 6 on his back he brought them back into the game with some great driving runs. faded somewhat in the second half. In the opening ten minutes Armagh looked quite capable. Lavery and Mackin were winning a fair share of ball in the mid field and Joe Feeney and Tony Kernan in particular looked lively upfont .
Armagh raced into a 5 or 6 point league and deservedly so. But the half forward line was faltering and young Collie Wattes and Roan Austin were having bad days at the office . Further in Ryan Henderson was well marked and Brian Mc Cone did show well at times. Tony Kernan going off after 15 minutes signalled the fight back from the students and by half time they were level. Poor tackling in defence lead to a few easy frees (Finn Mo being the main culprit here)and had Jamie Clarke not mised a few the shore road lads would have been in front by the half time whistle.
It was obvious that mid-field wasnt firing and in came Charlie vernon, up front young watters was replaced by Aaron kernan. They made a difference alright as you would expect. Kernan has to be given a good run here. For me he looks the part. Hughes went out of the game and charlie won quit a bit of possesion. It was in defence that the problems lay. Andy was given a torrid time and Barry Shannon had a tough one on Mc Anulla. Young Shane ONeil struggled on Peter Hughes all through. He did score what for me was the best point of the game mid way through the second half. Vincie Martin did resonably well on Forker. Brendan Donaghy was quiet enough . He should impose himself more on the game. Stevie came on with twelve minutes to go touched the ball three times once fom play and twice from frees. One which he scored the other to square the game up he missed. Looks Lean though and interested.
Monaghan will be a much tougher job on Wednesday night in Iniskeen. It 's early days and I wouldnt want to read to much into the game but I was disappointed in some performnces. We finished up with 8 of our expected championsip team on.

As for the new rules, ABSOLUTELY a waste of time . The hand pass was a shambles . The game was continualy stopped and frees awarded for what seemed no reason but no doubt the ref spotted passing with the open hand. To the all those present they all looked perfectly good passs. He did not use the advantage rule once . Had he done so the UUJ wuld have ben staright through for a goal. Throughout the whole game we had one or maybe two marks ,that was it in total . Teams were more prepared to break rather than let someone catch. As someone pointed out the problem lies with players surrounding the player in possession while that player is on the ground. I am a resaonable person but I see no advantage to gaelic football with the implementation of these new rules. The only one that is any good "the advantage rule" he didnt play it.
Anyway its only January roll on Wednesday night Iniskeen, How do I get there ? OK I know in a car, but what road to I go from Armagh city.