County Sign L'Estrange

[steno]

The most recent addition to the County squad for the 2007 season is 20 year old defender Sean L’Estrange.

http://www.kildarecountyfc.com/news/news-details.asp?NewsID=820

What do you all think?.

[Philly]

Cool name :D

Any Kilkenny fans have any info on him?

[KildareFan]

Oh God, it's going to be a long season.

2 signings from Kilkenny are hardly going to insprire us to finish much higher than we did last season

[Philly]

Yeah, remember we signed those two lads from Kilkenny - Damien Brennan and Ben Whelehan... awful players... :rolleyes:

[Kildare Lad]

Hahaha, yeah, id say these 2 could be decent players, both of them played for premier clubs in 2005, so they cant be too terrible....

[Philly]

We have a knack for spotting talent at Buckley Park - hopefully these lads will do well.

I'd like to see us sign Willie Doyle too, he was with them last season.

[pineapple stu]

L'Estrange was with Shels the year before. Got sent off against us in the Cup.

Other than that though, I know nothing...

[Philly]

Thanks for the info :)

Was it a good sending off, yeah?!

[pineapple stu]

Himself and another lad sandwiched Gary Dicker. He'd been booked already and took the blame for this one too. Didn't have the savvy to pass it off on his team mate. :)

[steno]

I think L'Estrange and Willie Doyle were two of Kilkenny Citys better players last season. L'Estrange played 32 times for Kilkenny City last season so hopefully that says it all really.

[KildareFan]

I see that Athlone have signed Davy Byrne and Dave O'Dowd to add to the signing of Paul McTiernan.

Now, they are signings worth getting excited about. These are the kind of guys we should be aspiring to sign if we are going to get any better

[steno]

Couldn't agree more KildareFan, 2 signings from Kilkenny aren't exactly going to turn the heads. I would have loved to have seen County sign Davy Byrne in particular.

There are still some decent players from Galway and Sligo available for free.
1 advantage that Athlone has over County is the fact that the town is located a lot closer to Galway, Sligo and Longford compared to Newbridge , not to mention a brand new spanking 5,000 seater stand.

Hopefullly there will be some sort of news in the near future regarding a really good signing or two but not holding my breath tbh.

[KildareFan]

There doesn't seem to be any real drive or ambition from inside the club. It's as though the club seems to think getting through the season is an achievement.

Once again, we come to the end of a season only to lose our best player. Don't worry, if Donnelly or L'Estrange turn out to be any good, they will only be with us for 1 season.

The clubs seems to have given up on marketing and advertising, I predict a season pretty much the same as last with us finishing in the bottom 3 again

Sorry if i sound so negative the whole time but it's hard to be positive with this club at times!!

[Kildare Lad]

I heard that we have a lot of foreigners on triail, altough the person who told me is not the most reliable source! So i would suspect that it is a lie. But if its not how would you expect a couple of foreigners would do in the team?

I'd also imagine this year we will field alot of trial players in our friendlies, such as we did last year and just sign the best of the bunch............

[steno]

I heard that we have a lot of foreigners on triail, altough the person who told me is not the most reliable source! So i would suspect that it is a lie. But if its not how would you expect a couple of foreigners would do in the team?

I'd also imagine this year we will field alot of trial players in our friendlies, such as we did last year and just sign the best of the bunch............

If they are good enough then thats great. Trial games are great but the club needs to move quickly on some of the better free agnets if we are to progress in anyway this/next season.






Once again, we come to the end of a season only to lose our best player. Don't worry, if Donnelly or L'Estrange turn out to be any good, they will only be with us for 1 season.

Agree totally. So frustrating loosing Steven Cooling to Waterford. If he was going to stay in Division One for another season he might as well have stayed with us. At the very least he would have been guaranteed first team football and at the most a better move to the premier and even a better chance of first team football there the following season. But its not just Cooling, How many great players have County lost to clubs now in the premier or have played in the premier?. The list is endless! literally!.





The clubs seems to have given up on marketing and advertising, I predict a season pretty much the same as last with us finishing in the bottom 3 again



Was a good bit of emphisas on the fact that there are now a fair contigent of local players in the squad, as if they are trying to attract more people using that but you are right there does need to be more advertisement and marketting apart fom this. The every 1 a winner draw appears to be agreat success but apart from that....

With the last 2 seasons not going great it is going to be harder to attract new fans to station road..... or the old fans back. The only advert I have ever seen was a poster on the gates of station road for a match, nothing in the local press apart from a bit in the match reports ( but I could be wrong). I never listen to KFM so I don't know about that.



Sorry if i sound so negative the whole time but it's hard to be positive with this club at times!!

I find it hard myself at times. The only positve I've drawn in the last while is that the club is appearently in abetter finanical position than it used to be and thats f**k all consolation.

But it makes Saturday a cheaper night out when it comes to home games 10yoyos in when i might have spent good knows what on drink for the 90 mins:D

[Philly]

Lads I understand it is frustrating being at the bottom of the pile but the board have to cut costs due to the massive overspending during the Keely / Hannigan era.

Financially things are better now though, and there are 22 players signed / on contract. This years team will be better than last years but will still be tightly budgeted.

Trust me, we'll get there. But for the moment we have to watch our spending.

[Kildare Lad]

Financially things are better now though, and there are 22 players signed / on contract. This years team will be better than last years but will still be tightly budgeted.

Any chance of letting us know them 22 players.....:confused:

[steno]

well from the announcements on the website, local press,

Goalkeepers: John Flynn.


Defenders: Philip Byrne, Alan McDermott, Colin Osbourne Owen Kavanagh, Sean L'Estrange

Midfielders: Steve McCrossan, Barry Slattery, Alan Bryne, Paul Rigney, Matt Rigney, Paul Donnelly

Strikers: Philip Gorman, Paddy Mahon and Trevor Bowers

Question Marks over Ian Malone, Barry Clancy, Gareth Christie, John Reilly, Darren Mc Kenna(Is he still with us?), Ian Brazil, I might have missed others.

Ger robinson should rejoin after the GAA championship with Meath. Means he will miss half the season.

Oh and Willie Doyle has appearently signed for Monaghan United.

[sniffa]

C'mon lads, steady on.
We must have made progress.
When we started out in Eircom League football the thought of playing a premier division side was one of horror.
Keep the score down, crowd the penalty area etc.
But now, years on I would have every confidence of getting at least a draw in a game v the Eircom League champions. I would actually fancy us to win.
Now there's progress :D :D :D