LOI Week 1

[Charlie Darwin]

Ten minutes in and no thread yet? Lads...

Cork City –v–St Patrick’s Athletic
Drogheda United –v–Dundalk
Limerick FC –v–Bray Wanderers
UCD –v–Bohemians
Sligo Rovers –v–Athlone Town
Shamrock Rovers –v–Derry City

Galway FC –v– Longford Town
Finn Harps –v– Waterford United
Shelbourne –v– Wexford Youths
Cobh Ramblers –v– Shamrock Rovers B

[Mr A]

Nary a goal in sight.

Worst.

Season.

Ever.

[McNasara]

Bohs 1
Paddy Kavanagh

and Drogs 1
Eric Foley

[Mr A]

Bohs 1 up and have so far outscored all the rest of the teams in the league combined.

[Mr A]

Drogheda 1 up as Dundalk completely fall apart after their great season last year.

[McNasara]

Cork 1
Garry Buckley

[Mr A]

3-0 Drogheda. Jeepers.

[McNasara]

More red cards than goals tonight, nearly!

[CraftyToePoke]

Fairly uninspired evening in Limerick by the sound of the updates too.

[adamd164]

Not a bad point against Pats considering we played over 20 mins with 10 men. Half the team had been booked by half time, Padraig Sutton was incredibly card happy.

We showed a lot of commitment and we looked very solid defensively. We also showed Pats respect by playing 5 in midfield, I'd expect us to go at lesser teams a lot more.

I think we've improved dramatically on last season.

[pineapple stu]

Bohs have improved anyway.

[Yossarian]

Well I'm not sure where to start with that. It looked like we gathered up 11 lads before the game who'd never met. Towell was anonymous and our defence was woeful. Higgins offered nothing in front of the back four. We had a couple of chances that we didn't take and were punished. I didn't see any positives for us and Drogs did well in pressing us and being clinical from their set pieces. Whatever about losing, that wouldn't bother me as much as the abject performances and complete lack of ideas.

[Longfordian]

Great result for Town in Galway. Good game, great crowd. I think we deserved it on the night. We look strong.

[SeanDrog]

Great result - I would have taken draw at the start. Shame Brennan got sent off . RTE saying a player from each side sent off at half time????

Great crowd - guessing around 4000 (1500 Dundalk 2500 Drogs) ... Guessing , hopefully official figure is released soon as I'm curious.

Some gate receipts :)

Obviously delighted by the result.

[SeanDrog]

Appears rte are right, two subs sent off at half time - Hughes for drogs

Good report here . Our squad is too small to have people sent off for stupid stuff :(

http://www.airtricityleague.ie/news/825-premier-division/match-reports-premier-division-2014/5224-drogheda-crush-local-rivals

[Terry]

Great result for Town in Galway. Good game, great crowd. I think we deserved it on the night. We look strong.

Enjoyable night with 2 good teams playing good football. Longford were rock solid at the back and they wont concede many goals this season. Fair play to their fans also, never stopped singing.

I think when Manning, Walsh, Murphy etc return to the team we will be much stronger.

[Acer]

Appears rte are right, two subs sent off at half time - Hughes for drogs

Good report here . Our squad is too small to have people sent off for stupid stuff :(

http://www.airtricityleague.ie/news/825-premier-division/match-reports-premier-division-2014/5224-drogheda-crush-local-rivals

The red was very harsh and I'd be very surprised if we didn't win an appeal on it.

The gate was great, credit to both teams for that. Doubt we'll see an "official figure" though!

I heard the issue at half time started with 2 other players but those two got involved and suffered for it.

The game itself was just a continuation of the Malone cup game, except this time we took our chances. I thought Dundalk looked better for the first 20 minutes of so but then we took control. We were different class in the second half.

[legendz]

Cork 1-1 St Pat’s,
Drogheda 4-1 Dundalk,
Limerick 0-0 Bray,
UCD 0-3 Bohemians.

Good start to the season for Bohs. This time 3 days time to see the goals!!!

[Longfordian]

Enjoyable night with 2 good teams playing good football. Longford were rock solid at the back and they wont concede many goals this season. Fair play to their fans also, never stopped singing.

I think when Manning, Walsh, Murphy etc return to the team we will be much stronger.

Yeah I expect ye'll be right up there. Connolly was good for ye. Great set up down there and very well run match night by the way. Great to have ye back

[NeverFeltBetter]

Should have a pool on the amount of red cards this season. Already its groan inducing.

[adamd164]

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BiJ1QjfIgAA44jh.jpg

[MeathDrog]

The red was very harsh and I'd be very surprised if we didn't win an appeal on it.

The gate was great, credit to both teams for that. Doubt we'll see an "official figure" though!

I heard the issue at half time started with 2 other players but those two got involved and suffered for it.

The game itself was just a continuation of the Malone cup game, except this time we took our chances. I thought Dundalk looked better for the first 20 minutes of so but then we took control. We were different class in the second half.

The red was perhaps slightly harsh but no way would the club win an appeal. Brennan stupidly lunged in from behind when 4-1 up.

[strikeforce]

Not a bad point against Pats considering we played over 20 mins with 10 men. Half the team had been booked by half time, Padraig Sutton was incredibly card happy.

We showed a lot of commitment and we looked very solid defensively. We also showed Pats respect by playing 5 in midfield, I'd expect us to go at lesser teams a lot more.

I think we've improved dramatically on last season.
I thought ref was a disgrace tonight, but cant complain about our skipper being sent off, he was warned twice before the second yellow. Crowd was def above 6,000. We will get better as the league progresses but there are a lot of good teams this year in the prem.

[oriel]

Great result - I would have taken draw at the start. Shame Brennan got sent off . RTE saying a player from each side sent off at half time????

Great crowd - guessing around 4000 (1500 Dundalk 2500 Drogs) ... Guessing , hopefully official figure is released soon as I'm curious.

Some gate receipts :)

Obviously delighted by the result.

4k???? I was there and there was 2k max, sure the ground only holds just over that. Decent crowd all the same. Terrible result and second half by us.

[SkStu]

Typical Kenny. Bit of pressure or expectation on him and he caves. Surprised he's gone rainman so early though.

Great start for us this season too. Title decider next week? ;)

[SeanDrog]

4k???? I was there and there was 2k max, sure the ground only holds just over that. Decent crowd all the same. Terrible result and second half by us.

Fair enough - I did say I was guessing lol clearly I'm not good at it. :)

I don't think the game result is any reflection of Dundallk real chances this year - a derby result. I still expect them to challenge.

[micls]

I thought ref was a disgrace tonight, but cant complain about our skipper being sent off, he was warned twice before the second yellow. Crowd was def above 6,000. We will get better as the league progresses but there are a lot of good teams this year in the prem.

I never understand why people overestimate the crowds so much and refuse to believe the official figures. There is no benefit at all to the club to lie about the attendance, in fact the opposite is true.

5,200 people means there were only 2000 empty seats. That is very easy at the cross, especially given there's always a few hundred left between home and away fans and the St. Anne's being the biggest stand. Sprinked empty seats here and there around the ground will account for the rest.

[Pablo Escobar]

I never understand why people overestimate the crowds so much and refuse to believe the official figures. There is no benefit at all to the club to lie about the attendance, in fact the opposite is true.

5,200 people means there were only 2000 empty seats. That is very easy at the cross, especially given there's always a few hundred left between home and away fans and the St. Anne's being the biggest stand. Sprinked empty seats here and there around the ground will account for the rest.
But there were no sprinkled empty seat, and certainly not 1000 of them. I'm not overestimating, I'm just calculating. Even if we ignore the pats section and it's crowd, 3x500 (per block) is 1500. That means 6000 seats remaining. Even if we say there were 500 extra empty seats (and there wasn't, as I couldn't see any), that's 5,500. Add in the extra people standing in the corners and there was a few hundred of them, plus the 200-300 pats fans to add back. Also, we seem to have run out of tickets at some point and apparently the pats fans tickets were scanning properly.

[PartySaint]

Good night down in Cork and a great crowd. One our of supporters buses broke down I the way down so there should have been another 50 odd there.

Happy enough with the point as a lot of teams will drop points down in Turners Cross.

Cork will have to change they're game plan a bit this season tho if they continue to kick everything that moves and continue with ridiculous late tackles like they were at last night they'll get a lot of players sent off.

Just on the Drogs game, I wouldn't worry too much if I was a Dundalk fan, early season form matters very little, we lost 2 of out first 4 games last season.

[Nesta99]

Im not worried by the result. If anything it knocks complacency on the head - there are no easy points likely to be coughed up this season (unless we continue our Limerick hoodoo). Credit to Horgan for putting together a side that will nick plenty of points off 'favourites'. That said any derby loss stings and it better be put right soon. Gartland is obviously a big miss for the side.

[strikeforce]

Good night down in Cork and a great crowd. One our of supporters buses broke down I the way down so there should have been another 50 odd there.

Happy enough with the point as a lot of teams will drop points down in Turners Cross.

Cork will have to change they're game plan a bit this season tho if they continue to kick everything that moves and continue with ridiculous late tackles like they were at last night they'll get a lot of players sent off.

Just on the Drogs game, I wouldn't worry too much if I was a Dundalk fan, early season form matters very little, we lost 2 of out first 4 games last season.
Your right regarding us kicking everything in sight last night, but it was our first home game and I think a lot of the tackles were mistimed. We will get better as we have players fighting for every position.

[oriel]

Imnot worried by the result. If anything it knocks complacency on the head - there are no easy points likely to be coughed up this season (unless we continue our Limerick hoodoo). Credit to Horgan for putting together a side that will nick plenty of points off 'favourites'. That said any derby loss stings and it better be put right soon. Gartland is obviously a big miss for the side.

I can tell you one thing, I am very worried about our ability to defend. That's 7 goals conceded now in our last 2 competitive games, Coleraine 2-3, then last night where Drogs looked like scoring every time they pressed forward and hammered us.

[adamd164]

Happy enough with the point as a lot of teams will drop points down in Turners Cross.

Cork will have to change they're game plan a bit this season tho if they continue to kick everything that moves and continue with ridiculous late tackles like they were at last night they'll get a lot of players sent off.

I agree some of the tackles were a bit rash but I think that was more the occassion getting to the players. Our gameplan was laid out to stifle pats, as it was a game we just didn't want to lose.. especially with a big home crowd.

Pat's are gonna have a lot of teams going hell for leather at them this year, as Rovers did before them. It just comes with the territory of being the league champions really. That doesn't excuse bad tackling though.

I don't think we'll be especially pleasing on the eye compared with some other teams in the division but we'll certainly pick up more points than we did last year, wherever that leaves us in the table.

[Pablo Escobar]

Good night down in Cork and a great crowd. One our of supporters buses broke down I the way down so there should have been another 50 odd there.

Happy enough with the point as a lot of teams will drop points down in Turners Cross.

Cork will have to change they're game plan a bit this season tho if they continue to kick everything that moves and continue with ridiculous late tackles like they were at last night they'll get a lot of players sent off.

Just on the Drogs game, I wouldn't worry too much if I was a Dundalk fan, early season form matters very little, we lost 2 of out first 4 games last season.
There were a few late tackles alright, but ironically the sending off was never a booking. There should have been a few Pats bookings in the first half too. But inconsistency in the league is typical.

[nigel-harps1954]

Entertaining, if not spectacular, 0-0 draw in Finn Park last night. Pitch was very, very difficult to play on. Weather has done the already struggling pitch no favours. Both teams missed chances to win, but Waterford look to be very organised and well drilled. If only they had a striker or two, they might have nicked a win.

A lot of work to do though before there's any classic football to be seen from Finn Harps or Waterford. As far as First Division has been concerned the past few seasons though, that was a decent game.

[disgruntled]

Good opening fixture at Turners Cross.
Draw was a fair result as City fought hard & put in a lot of effort.
Eight yellow & one red card but it was never a dirty game.
Sutton seemed to book everything all night.
Yes some were deserved but every foul is not a yellow card.

Pats have a fine squad & will be the one's to beat again this year.
City showed a commitment & willingness to work hard which was missing for large parts of last season.

A disappointment for me was every time anyone looked sideways at Anto Flood he was on the ground.
By the second half even the ref realized that Flood has a balance problem & just waved play on.
On one occasion he was on the ground with no one within ten yards of him.
He's a fine player & got an excellent goal but he doesn't need to exaggerate every touch.
Was also disappointed with Fahey who did very little throughout the game.

Super crowd at the game at nearly 5500.
Biggest I've seen at the Cross in years.

[Dodge]

Yes some were deserved but every foul is not a yellow card.
There were a lot more fouls than cards last night too. As mentioned above Dunleavy was spoken to twice after his booking




A disappointment for me was every time anyone looked sideways at Anto Flood he was on the ground.
By the second half even the ref realized that Flood has a balance problem & just waved play on.
On one occasion he was on the ground with no one within ten yards of him.
Flood left Pats in November

[poster]

Your poem doesn't rhyme disgruntled.

[Nesta99]

I can tell you one thing, I am very worried about our ability to defend. That's 7 goals conceded now in our last 2 competitive games, Coleraine 2-3, then last night where Drogs looked like scoring every time they pressed forward and hammered us.

I share your concern currently but I think it'll be put right with the return of Gartland. I am worried about options at the back though with a couple of injuries. Id have stuck Rossi in at CB ahead of Sheilds as i'd reckon he'd organise the back 4 in the absence of Gartland a job he does very well. The different las who could fill in at CB are all individually capable but need some leadership. Maybe Sava is an answer to this too? Cherrie isnt vocal enough.

[Nesta99]

There were a lot more fouls than cards last night too. As mentioned above Dunleavy was spoken to twice after his booking


Flood left Pats in November

Fagan/Flood close enough to be related and have the balance problems! Causing the confusion

Cut of each other just take away the beard...

20602061

[Jofspring]

Isn't Fagan small though? Flood is like 6ft and stick thin.

On our match, we were very poor. Pitch is still very bobbly with the rugby still going on. Spent most the match looking up. We badly need our injuries to clear up. Only 5 subs last night and everyone barr Sheedy who is 19 was an under 19.
Very disappointing to see Duggan sent off already. We may have to throw Prince Agyemang in at the deep end next week.

[desaintsno.12]

Great crowd down in cork, brilliant buzz.
Shame They have a team of hatchet men though. Disgraceful tactics.

[Charlie Darwin]

Athlone 1 up in Sligo, Mark Hughes with a second-half penalty. Half an hour to go.

[SeanDrog]

PP had athlone at 15-1! Given cookes good results v Sligo last year I took a punt ... Athlone now winning 0-1 ...... Come on athlone :)

[Charlie Darwin]

That didn't last long. Maybe I just shouldn't post anything. It was Gorman with the penalty actually. Russell equalised.

Shamrock Rovers B still 0-1 up in Cobh. Daniel Purdy with a screamer apparently. Still wouldn't be surprised if these were the bottom two come November.

[SeanDrog]

Damn 1-1 now

[placid casual]

Great crowd down in cork, brilliant buzz.
Shame They have a team of hatchet men though. Disgraceful tactics.

jaysis the junkies excuses have started already.
nevermind, you have quigley to get youse out of a jam- he'll break his balls for youse!:loser:

[Nesta99]

Isn't Fagan small though? Flood is like 6ft and stick thin.


Ach whats a few inches between kindred spirits!

15-1 PP really dont do their work on LoI. If i'd spotted that myself i'd have stuck a few quid on. Its an amusing process walking into a PP office in North London and waiting for the reaction to the betting slip - "Airtricity league of what?... Droggheeda v Dundawlk wtf"

[SeanDrog]

Ach whats a few inches between kindred spirits!

15-1 PP really dont do their work on LoI. If i'd spotted that myself i'd have stuck a few quid on. Its an amusing process walking into a PP office in North London and waiting for the reaction to the betting slip - "Airtricity league of what?... Droggheeda v Dundawlk wtf"

Lol I can well imagine

[SeanDrog]

Sligo 2-1