A game for starters and finishers
Oisín O’Neill and Conor Turbitt each had to settle with a place on the bench for Armagh’s championship opener against Tyrone. But that’s the wrong perspective to take, says Kieran McGeeney.
O’Neill came on in the 50th minute and made a massive contribution to Armagh’s extra-time win with a haul of 0-6, including his side’s only two-pointer of the contest. Turbitt came on in the 43rd minute and finished the game with 0-2, including the match winner late in extra-time.
But this has been a work in progress strategy. The pair came off the bench in Armagh’s last two league games as well – against Dublin and Kerry – and on both occasions the duo got in on the scoring act as well. So rather than looking at them as subs, McGeeney is viewing them as finishers. It was a strategy that helped deliver an All-Ireland in 2024 with Stefan ‘Soupy’ Campbell coming in off the bench.
“That [mentality of subs] is going back to the old days when people thought you were starting the better players,” said McGeeney.
READ MORE
“The game is about winning ultimately, whatever strategy you have to facilitate that. There is no doubt that Soupy was one of our best three forwards, then [when] the game opens up, in those moments you want players like him when [opposition] players are fatigued.
“It is hard to deal with it because [players] go home and are being told that you should be doing this and you should be doing that but when they are here, in fairness to everybody there isn’t one player in there that doesn’t put the team first. And sometimes we get it wrong too. There is no manager out there that is trying to hold a player back. What you are looking to do, is trying to win the game and [trying] different things. Some of them work and some of them don’t. It is as simple as that, it is definitely a team sport.” — Gordon Manning
Cork’s custody battle over Barry Walsh indicative of a bigger game
Over the weekend a custody dispute emerged over Barry Walsh, Cork’s terrific young forward. Walsh was Cork’s outstanding breakthrough player during the hurling league but wasn’t part of the match day panel for the league final presumably because he had played for the under-20s four days earlier against Limerick. He scored 2-9 in that game.
Walsh was also top scorer for Cork’s under-20s against Tipperary in the opening round, but he will be unavailable for their crucial game against Waterford on Wednesday night. The Cork senior management have made the decision to pull him out with a view to next Sunday’s opening round of the senior championship against Tipperary.
In an interview with Denis Hurley, the Cork under-20s manager Noel Furlong said that “our whole group is disappointed” and “we wouldn’t agree with the decision.”
How best to manage the most talented under-20s players has been an issue for the last number of years. In 2022 Limerick reached the under-20 All-Ireland final without the services of their best player, Cathal O’Neill, because he had played in the senior championship earlier that year.
The rule at that stage was that once a player had made an appearance in the senior championship he couldn’t play for the under-20s again until the senior team were eliminated. That year Limerick won the senior title and lost the under-20 final to Kilkenny.
John Kiely, the Limerick manager, was highly critical of the rule at the time. “It’s disappointing that we’re penalising our best players,” he said.
A year later, when Ben O’Connor managed Cork to win an under-20 All-Ireland, Eoin Downey had made a breakthrough with the Cork seniors so was not always available to the Cork under-20s. The rule was changed that year to permit players to line out for the seniors and the under-20s, but not in the same seven-day period. Downey missed two rounds of the under-20s championship but was allowed to line-out in the All-Ireland final after the fixture was changed.
After that, Cork brought a successful motion to Congress allowing for players to play both senior and under-20 outside a 60-hour window. Under that rule, for example, Dara Sheedy was allowed to play for the Cork under-20 footballers against Clare last Thursday night and against Limerick in the senior championship yesterday.
Walsh’s last appearance in the league was against Offaly, when he was taken off at half-time in deference to his upcoming games with the Cork under-20s.
“Look, we’ll have to try and manage Barry as well,” said O’Connor after that match. “He’s only a young fella so we don’t want to be giving him any chance of getting injuries. Ian Jones [strength and conditioning coach] will sort that out. He’ll tell us what to do with him and we’ll just follow his advice. He [Walsh] is under-20 so he’ll be with the 20s.”
Reading between the lines, it is easy to imagine that Walsh will make his championship debut against Tipperary next Sunday, and that two games in the space of four days was deemed to be too much.
Cork’s under-20s will miss him sorely on Wednesday. — Denis Walsh
Wicklow landing punches rather than being a punchline
The wiseasses never lose much face sneering at Wicklow football. For decades, people have used them as a punchline, quicker to crack jokes about referees in boots of cars and various Battles of Aughrims than to actually drill down into what they’re doing out on the east coast. Sunday’s win over Carlow won’t change that, necessarily. But it’s worth stopping for a second to examine it just the same.
Oisin McConville’s side beat the Division Four champions – on their home patch, let’s not forget – by 2-15 to 1-7. That makes it five years in a row that Wicklow have won their opening match in the Leinster Championship. Dublin and Meath are the only other teams who can say the same.
Across those five years, they’ve beaten Carlow in Carlow, Longford in Longford, Westmeath in Portlaoise, along with Carlow and Laois in Aughrim. They did it this time on the back of a gruesome last-minute calamity at the end of the league, losing out on promotion to the last kick of the ball after coughing up an 11-point lead. That’s only three weeks ago – they’d have been roundly forgiven for licking their wounds and waiting on the Tailteann Cup.
But no, instead they filleted Carlow on Sunday and are pawing the dirt waiting on Dublin to come to Aughrim this weekend. In Oisin McConville’s fourth year, they’re clearly a united bunch who want more our of life than being the eternal butts of jokes. Good for them. — Malachy Clerkin
Leitrim come in from the cold in Connacht
In the mad, frantic ending at Markievicz Park on Sunday, Leitrim found a way to win a football match in Connacht. On Sligo’s home ground, in between the sunshine and the showers, they also produced the first minor shock of the championship – and an utterly deserving one too.
It was a victory ultimately built on character, something the Leitrim players will know was often questioned over the last decade or so. When manager Steven Poacher was unable to field a team for a league match last year, thus forfeiting the game against Fermanagh, it felt like the county had reached a new low-low.
Poacher has been doggedly rebuilding ever since, and the 3-15 to 1-20 win on Sunday unquestionably marked a profound turning point. It was Leitrim’s first win over Sligo in the Connacht championship since 2011, and their first win in the province of any note since, considering their only other wins were over London and New York. Not forgetting they also lost to New York on penalties in 2023, the first time New York won any match in the Connacht championship.
As ever with Leitrim, it certainly wasn’t easy. With the outstanding Barry McNulty leading the way – he finished with 1-6 – Leitrim were 10 points clear early in the second half, before Sligo mounted a spirited comeback. A two-pointer from Alan McLoughlin brought Sligo back to a point with three minutes left, and suddenly Leitrim looked out for the count.
Sligo had two chances to possibly win or force extra-time in the last 90 seconds - Lee Deignan missing a two-point free, before McLoughlin opted to play another free short. Leitrim pounced on that one, and so just about held on. Had it gone to extra-time, the sense was there would only be one winner.
Instead, Leitrim got their day in the sun. A home semi-final against Galway awaits, but no matter what happens from here, 2026 will be remembered as the year Leitrim came back in from the cold in Connacht. — Ian O’Riordan
