Series 32 (+ catch-up)

[brendy_éire]

Friday:
Cork City - St. Patrick's Athletic
Derry City - Sligo Rovers
Galway United - Longford Town
Shamrock Rovers - Bray Wanderers
Wexford Youths - Finn Harps

Sunday:
Dundalk - Bohemians

Monday:
Cork City - Wexford Youths

Tuesday:
St. Patrick's Athletic - Dundalk

------------------------------------------

Whilst Cork-Pats is important, arguably the biggest game tonight is in Ferrycarrig. A win for Harps and they're safe, a win for Wexford will put them three behind Harps with a game in hand. Goal difference is almost equal between the sides too. Should be an interesting one.
Elsewhere, not much to get excited about. A win for Derry guarantees third spot, whilst Sligo have an outside chance of fourth if they win.
Shamrock Rovers will guarantee Europa League with a win, though a draw would probably do them too.

[El-Pietro]

Our game is an irrelevance at this stage. Wexford - Harps is the big game. Everything else is effectively done and dusted.

[Longfordian]

I wish we didn't have more games to play ffs

[ToberonaTornado]

Anyone got the full schedule for the play-off matches all the way to the final?

[littlebray]

Anyone got the full schedule for the play-off matches all the way to the final?

Here, as ever (http://www.braywanderers.com/showarticle.php?id=735#Playoffs)

Edit: I suppose I should include the 11th Premier now? no way back, as they say ...

[BonnieShels]

Serious noise in Oriel tonight watching it on TV.

[osarusan]

"Dundork".

F**k off Canning. I mean, how does he end up even saying it like that?

[BonnieShels]

Fupping flares!


Congrats to the Town!

[patrickccfc]

"Dundork".

F**k off Canning. I mean, how does he end up even saying it like that?

I was watching the zenit game on a Russian stream and even they could say dundalk correctly. Christ it's irritating when he says it

[nigel-harps1954]

I thought it was more irrirating to hear him call Mountney 'Mountfield' repeatedly.

[White Horse]

"Dundork".

F**k off Canning. I mean, how does he end up even saying it like that?

Can't they find a commentator who speaks English?

[Charlie Darwin]

I thought it was more irrirating to hear him call Mountney 'Mountfield' repeatedly.
Dean Fitzgerald up front for the Bozos as well.

[Oldred]

I thought it was more irrirating to hear him call Mountney 'Mountfield' repeatedly.

Ah easy on now. Poor fella was probably just after mowing the lawn!

[Pablo Escobar]

Dean Fitzgerald up front for the Bozos as well.
Owen Wearer came on too.

[nigel-harps1954]

Ah easy on now. Poor fella was probably just after mowing the lawn!

In Oriel Park.

[Ezeikial]

Apologies to any of the Bohs fans in Oriel Park who had to endure unacceptable behaviour from some idiots in the crowd on the pitch after the game. Instead of celebrating a fantastic achievement, some felt the need to goad and taunt those in the away section .

Embarrassing and unacceptable from people who I wish would just stay away.

[Sam_Heggy]

Cork are a great side, never doubted them for a second tonight.......

[TonyD]

"Dundork".

F**k off Canning. I mean, how does he end up even saying it like that?

Amen to that. Bugs the living sh1t out of me too. Except I hear it more as "Dandork"

[Sam_Heggy]

Barring a major disaster, it looks as if Harps are guaranteed Premier Division football next season. Thank chr!st.....

[patrickccfc]

Barring a major disaster, it looks as if Harps are guaranteed Premier Division football next season. Thank chr!st.....

Yeah I think your safe enough now. More chance of us getting another 4 than wexford getting one I'd say

[White Horse]

Cork responding to the disappointment of losing out on the title in the right way. The Drogs must be licking their lips at the prospect of playing Wexford in the play off.

[nigel-harps1954]

Yay!!

[White Horse]

Congratulations to Finn Harps, though Ollie is probably not counting his chickens yet.

[El-Pietro]

Apologies to any of the Bohs fans in Oriel Park who had to endure unacceptable behaviour from some idiots in the crowd on the pitch after the game. Instead of celebrating a fantastic achievement, some felt the need to goad and taunt those in the away section .

Embarrassing and unacceptable from people who I wish would just stay away.
Didn't watch the game so not sure what happened, but we had similar in 2014. Load of Dundalk fans straight over the the away section, many throwing things into our end.

[Yossarian]

Didn't watch the game so not sure what happened, but we had similar in 2014. Load of Dundalk fans straight over the the away section, many throwing things into our end.

Unfortunately it was very similar and these idiots threw some fireworks in aswell. I really wish they would just stay away if they're going to act like that. I don't understand why they couldn't just celebrate the title win for itself rather than go to goad the Bohs fans.

[da bishop]

Congrats to Dundalk ...do RTE actually realise what a disaster Canning is??

[El-Pietro]

Walk in the park for City tonight. Pretty much a perfect night. No new injuries, lots of players got rest. A 27th goal for Maguire and great performances from the younger player. Cian Coleman off the bench at half time, 90 minutes for Conor McCarthy and Ogbene. McCarthy with a header from a corner, Chiedozie with two goals, an assist and won a penalty.
That led to a great/horrible moment. Sean Maguire was off at half time (rested) so Ian Turner was the designated penalty taker, but Ogbene was on a hattrick. The penalty was in front of the Shed and everyone was screaming for him to take it. Even started booing Turner when he put the ball down and got ready to take it. Eventually Danny Morrissey talked Chedozie into taking it, and explained the situation to Turner. Turner cleary wasn't happy but what could he do.

Unfortunately at this point, the ref started talking to a defender so the whole thing took a couple of minutes. The pressure was building and clearly got to Dozie and he missed it. Well, he put it low and The Wexford keeper saved it.

Still, it was great to get a glimpse of the future. All three of these players have a lot to learn but its great to see them with positive performances.

Danny Morrissey also had a goal disallowed for offside, really good finish at the near post. I thought it was harsh on him, he could do with a bit of good luck.


I'd be a little worried for Wexford going into the play off. We weren't all that good tonight, but everytime we got the ball we looked like scoring.

[nigel-harps1954]

Cracking save by Trevor Cherrie on Soccer Republic there.

[oriel]

Apologies to any of the Bohs fans in Oriel Park who had to endure unacceptable behaviour from some idiots in the crowd on the pitch after the game. Instead of celebrating a fantastic achievement, some felt the need to goad and taunt those in the away section .

Embarrassing and unacceptable from people who I wish would just stay away.

Agreed, as mentioned earlier it was similar to the situation after the Cork match at home in Oct 2014. Embarrassing stuff by a minority of morons.

[Charlie Darwin]

Sounds like Dundalk has a discipline problem.

[Real ale Madrid]

Apologies to any of the Bohs fans in Oriel Park who had to endure unacceptable behaviour from some idiots in the crowd on the pitch after the game. Instead of celebrating a fantastic achievement, some felt the need to goad and taunt those in the away section .

Embarrassing and unacceptable from people who I wish would just stay away.

Should be a points deduction for flares.

I've always said it.

[PartySaint]

One for Cork fans, If Caulfield doesn't win the Cup is he is danger of losing his job?

[El-Pietro]

One for Cork fans, If Caulfield doesn't win the Cup is he is danger of losing his job?
No. He has one year left on his deal. I think we won't be looking to renew it until mid way through next year at the earliest though. Probably dependent on how we do in Europe.
The only thing that could hurt him is crowds. If fans don't believe we can compete for trophies then we could see a drop off next season regardless of how well we are doing.

[White Horse]

I was very dismissive of John Caulfield up to this season. He spent a lot of money on the 2015 team and they were poor. However, he realised he was going in the wrong direction and overhauled his team this season. He is showing the capacity to change; he is learning a lot from Stephen Kenny.

He still makes bizarre decisions, playing his best attacking midfielder as a right back, signing and retaining players he has no intention of using (Holohan), resorting to hoofball too readily, overplaying certain players (O'Connor), using the slowest centre half partnership in the league etc.

However, if he improves this team by 10% and Dundalk regress a little next season, he could well be celebrating this time next year.

[PartySaint]

I was very dismissive of John Caulfield up to this season. He spent a lot of money on the 2015 team and they were poor. However, he realised he was going in the wrong direction and overhauled his team this season. He is showing the capacity to change; he is learning a lot from Stephen Kenny.

He still makes bizarre decisions, playing his best attacking midfielder as a right back, signing and retaining players he has no intention of using (Holohan), resorting to hoofball too readily, overplaying certain players (O'Connor), using the slowest centre half partnership in the league etc.

However, if he improves this team by 10% and Dundalk regress a little next season, he could well be celebrating this time next year.

He's in a bit of a funny situation, Cork have obviously massively improved under him. Themselves and Dundalk are miles ahead of everyone else.

He's finished second 3 times to arguably the best team the country has ever seen and brought them to 2 cup finals

So he could could argue there's not much more he can do and Dundalk are just a better team.

BUT he has made some strange decisions in important matches and probably thrown away at least 1 league title with his negativity

[White Horse]

He's in a bit of a funny situation, Cork have obviously massively improved under him.

Particularly this season. There is no reason that shouldn't continue.

[Mr A]

He is showing the capacity to change; he is learning a lot from Stephen Kenny.


Stephen Kenny, the magic manager who gets credit even for the good work of his rivals but the fiasco of the dual contracts with Wellvan simply didn't stick whatsoever.

Truly this man is the son of God.

[oldyouth]

I'd be a little worried for Wexford going into the play off. We weren't all that good tonight, but everytime we got the ball we looked like scoring.

It wasn't ideal, but I would expect only 4 of our players who started last night, to start against Cobh/Drogheda. 2 x 17yr old players, 1 under 19 making debut at Turners Cross and the result was never going our way. The automatic survival route was over after our draw with Harps last week. Last night and next Friday was about avoiding injury and suspension

[Mr A]

The frantic nature of the game on Friday night meant it was going to be very hard for Wexford to be at full tilt last night again. I heard Shane Keegan saying at one stage that Wexford hadn't won on a Monday all year. The fixture pile up has been very tough on the part time sides.

[oldyouth]

The frantic nature of the game on Friday night meant it was going to be very hard for Wexford to be at full tilt last night again. I heard Shane Keegan saying at one stage that Wexford hadn't won on a Monday all year. The fixture pile up has been very tough on the part time sides.

I think the midweek games were the biggest culture shock for us. Apart from the fitness and (more importantly) recovery aspect, we had player availability problems. As proud as I am of our amateur club giving it a good go, I personally don't think we could ever compete properly on that basis

I'm not talking about bringing in better players, I would just love to see what we could have achieved with the same squad, but being able to train properly 4-5 days a week

[TonyD]

Should be a points deduction for flares.

I've always said it.

Yeah, about 25 should do it.:p

[pineapple stu]

Dundalk's reserves (plus Benson) aren't up to much anyway.

4-0 down at half time!

[patrickccfc]

Not an all too surprising scoreline. Probably a bit surreal for Benson though being part of that, given the games he's been involved in

[patrickccfc]

Come back is on 4-2

[pineapple stu]

Not an all too surprising scoreline. Probably a bit surreal for Benson though being part of that, given the games he's been involved in
I didn't Pat's had it in them to be leading anyone 4-0 at half time to be honest.

Though there's some players in there Benson will recognise at least -

Rogers, Gannon, Grimes, Barrett, Poynton, Benson, Shiels, Ciaran O’Connor, Keane, Dalton, Michael O’Connor. Subs - Sava, Mountney, Ubaezuond, Reilly, Whelan, O'Connor, Gartland. Ubaezuond (quick copy and paste!) came on for Grimes very early on. Gartland and Mountney are on now.

[BonnieShels]

And now 5-2...

[nigel-harps1954]

Buckin' hell that's some scoreline. Pat's for the league in 2017.

Amazing how a team can lose just under a fifth of their games and win the league title.

[Charlie Darwin]

Are you Rovers in disguise?

[jinxy lilywhite]

Dave Robertson tweeted that dundalk had thrown in the towel on the league #nointegrity ffs

[White Horse]

I was expecting an meaningless end of season fixture. I wasn't expecting a twitter war.

As for the game, some lovely finishing from Pats. Their goals were of a very high standard. Dundalk made a huge tactical mistake when Grimes went off, they put on a young winger at left back and he was destroyed by Conan Byrne. It was brutal for the young lad and Kenny had to take him off at half time. I felt sorry for the player, it was too much to ask of him.