Ucd (h)

What a difference a week makes! Just before kick-off on Friday evening, three defeats on the spin and a general lack of form within the squad gave few grounds for optimism, but suddenly two rapid-fire goals provide our first win on grass and lift the team to the heady heights of mid-table. That said, the Students are generally tough opponents to break down, and their draw with Treaty last week belies the current foot of the table status. Still, this is a fixture that appears ripe for the winning, and our performance on Friday will highlight whether we can find some consistent form, and potentially challenge for the play-offs.

Kerry need to start going on winning runs. No easy task for sure. No real momentum has been built up the last few years.
It'll be interesting as usual to see what starting XI is selected tomorrow. That was a big result last week. Interesting selection and positioning for Brookwell last week.
UCD despite their current league position cannot be taken lightly. Need a controlled performance. No sloppy concessions of goals and to take the chances. Need to start picking up 3 points more consistently if a playoff push is on the cards.

Welcome to mid table football and all the consistent inconsistency it brings. Poor performance, the team that tried to play football deservedly won out in the end. We are a hard watch at home these days - 3 straight 1 nil defeats. Kick and rush football.

Strangely I’d be confident we will go and beat treaty next week away too!!! The way the division is shaping up there could be very little points difference between 3rd and 10th… and Cobh might even be dragged back into it too.. Dundalk though are run away winners even at this stage ( the advantage of full time football and circa €350k over everyone else in uefa solidarity payments).

Good crowd last night, 780 i believe, unfortunately the performance and energy levels were very poor. The 2 centre halves for Ucd must have been in dreamland watching all those long balls straight onto their heads. Also the team weren't pressing together. Lost count of the number of times Sean Mcgrath chased to close down and looked around to see no one following him. That's basic stuff at this level.
On a positive note good to see Sam back and this new striker gives us different options physically. Watching him in the warm up he could really get his laces through the ball.

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Originally Posted by Zico

We are a hard watch at home these days - 3 straight 1 nil defeats. Kick and rush football.

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Exactly what I was going to say. It was a tough watch after the goal. Just kick and rush football. No cohesion or constructive build up. Going to be an up and down season. Little consistency so far. Still chasing back to back league victories. If they cannot string two or three victories, they will not be making the playoffs.

Dare I say the current style of play is part of the Galway Utd influence!!!

We may be 3 points better off than this point last season, but I think we were far braver on the ball and played with much more ambition last year. At times it was hand on heart stuff, with the passing around the back and taking short kick outs etc., but it does create more space and definitely we were better to watch.

Struggling to understand the decision to play Brookwell at center half when he is so crucial to keeping our shape in midfield and we had other options at center half too.. perhaps this best sums up the mindset right now - contain the opposition with a conservative approach.

Brookwell is a tough one. Some on here expected him to fill in at centre back instead of Williams in one of the earlier games. Off the back of the Wexford game they probably saw no need to change it. Seems McQueen, Alabi and Sam are the only genuine CBs in contention. Brookwell and Williams then due to their versatility as back up.

[QUOTE=listowelceltic;2219808]Good crowd last night, 780 i believe, unfortunately the performance and energy levels were very poor.

Crowds are well up this year - even excluding Dundalk sell out, crowds are still up about 20% on last seasons average. Keeping it at this level is important. Would like to see the club do a bit more to improve match day experience, a lot of clubs have small fanzones with portable bars now (Galway, Shels and recently Bray - looks busy behind the goal at their games now and definitely attracts more fans, as well as bring more money in). Also, there will be games where crowd can dip below 500, usually the back to back home games - club need to be proactive on these occasions and offer free schoolboy / girls tickets to get crowd up.

Sponsorship is well up this year too (looks like new shorts sponsor now on board), keeping attendance figure high will help retain and bring in more sponsorship. New sponsor in for girls U17 too.

Whatever about the on field frustrations, the club is making very good progress off the field.

[QUOTE=Zico;2219866]

Quote:

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Originally Posted by listowelceltic

Good crowd last night, 780 i believe, unfortunately the performance and energy levels were very poor.

Crowds are well up this year - even excluding Dundalk sell out, crowds are still up about 20% on last seasons average. Keeping it at this level is important. Would like to see the club do a bit more to improve match day experience, a lot of clubs have small fanzones with portable bars now (Galway, Shels and recently Bray - looks busy behind the goal at their games now and definitely attracts more fans, as well as bring more money in). Also, there will be games where crowd can dip below 500, usually the back to back home games - club need to be proactive on these occasions and offer free schoolboy / girls tickets to get crowd up.

Sponsorship is well up this year too (looks like new shorts sponsor now on board), keeping attendance figure high will help retain and bring in more sponsorship. New sponsor in for girls U17 too.

Whatever about the on field frustrations, the club is making very good progress off the field.

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Much like you see bunting around Tralee town centre when counties visit for the League, the Chamber of Commerce could also put up some colours for First Division games, though of course, doing so eighteen times might be a bit of a drain on their resources!

Putting up colours for a select few games might be more likely. First home league game of the season, big match days like the visit of Dundalk, big cup games and the playoff semi final all going improvingly well!