Setanta Cup 2011

**White Horse** · 15/05/2011, 12:45 PM

Originally Posted by holidaysong

Dundalk fans were packed into the northern half of the West stand. It was about 2 fans for every seat standing in those blocks. Most fans had to make do with standing along the walk ways as there was nowhere else to go.

Having 'unreserved seating' for a game that was always likely to be (or close to) a sellout is just stupid.

The organisation was shambolic.

People standing on stairwells and walkways. It was dangerous.

A lot of the empty seats were reserved for the FAI or Setanta. It gave a very misleading impression of how many people were there.

**White Horse** · 15/05/2011, 12:48 PM

Originally Posted by hoopy

People seem to be missing the fact that Dundalk had a gael force breeze behind them and did very little with it.

We don't do hoof-ball.

We played on the deck and outpassed and out-played Rovers during that period. Alas the injury to Bryne disrupted our rhythm and Rovers got a foot-hold in the game.

Rovers have the bigger squad and it told yesterday. That is football.

**born2bwild** · 15/05/2011, 1:20 PM

Originally Posted by dong

Deserved Shams win it must be said. They have a lot of quality and depth in that squad. Twigg and McCabe are two excellent subs to be bringing on. Tough on Dundalk to lose Byrne and they offered little after that.
I watched the game on TV and Matthews pro - Shams bias was all too evident yet again. A co-commentator is supposed to at least give the impression that he is neutral.
I hope we can beat Shels in the EA cup and give him a good sickening. At least he might survive the chop this time. No disrespect to Shels but the man is a total gimp.

Why do you think he is a gimp?

**Dave_SRFC** · 15/05/2011, 1:26 PM

Originally Posted by White Horse

We don't do hoof-ball.

We played on the deck and outpassed and out-played Rovers during that period. Alas the injury to Bryne disrupted our rhythm and Rovers got a foot-hold in the game.

Absolute rubbish, you were second best everywhere yesterday..

**dong** · 15/05/2011, 2:01 PM

Originally Posted by born2bwild

Why do you think he is a gimp?

For the reasons stated.
He's supposed to be objective in his analysis of games, but he carries petty grudges from the past with him and makes it a bit too obvious.
Don't really rate him as a manager either.

**dfx-** · 15/05/2011, 2:05 PM

Alan Matthews would be down the list of pro-Rovers people. Down there with pauliek and Damien Hancock, for that matter

**Rasputin** · 15/05/2011, 2:25 PM

Doesnt come across that way at all when hes commentating, you can almost hear him salavating at the mouth when anything Shams is mentioned.
Terrible pundit but understandable since Setanta do employ Felix Healy, also an absolute joke of a manager.

**HulaHoop** · 15/05/2011, 2:49 PM

Thought we fully deserved our win. First 30 minutes Dundalk went at it hell for leather and we struggled to get out of our half for long periods of the opening half hour and had to dig deep to keep them at bay. When Dundalk inevitably couldn't keep that pace going and dropped off a bit towards the end of the first half we played our football and dominated the rest of the game creating numerous chances, hit the woodwork three times and ultimately scored two well deserved goals. O'Neill's 4-2-3-1 worked very well against Dundalk's midfield which is where the game was won. By the time we sacrificed a midfielder for a striker to go 4-4-2 Dundalk's midfielders were too tired to take advantage of there being one less Rovers midfielder to deal with. Tactically excellent from the much criticised O'Neill.

**oriel** · 15/05/2011, 2:55 PM

Thought Dundalk totally outpassed Rovers in the first half, and our defence coped very easy with anything Rovers offered. 2nd half different story, our wingers never got involved, kept losing the ball, this created huge gaps in the middle, Rovers exposed, tightened their grip on m/f and starting to take over. Byrne off, replaced by a 19 local lad v Twigg and MCCabe coming on obviously had another twist. In then end Rovers totally deserved their win.

Overally pleased with the progress we are making, even getting to a Cup Final is a huge achievement considering we were in the FD 3 years ago. Agree with organisation, there were 5 people standing in front of me using a space of 2 seats.
Zero stewarding, more a case of 'on you go lads'

Ps How were Rovers allowed or wanted to wear black shorts ? Surely white would have been the choice.

Anyway I have enjoyed the whole setanta experience, 30k and good few win bonus's was a great pay out.

What was the official crowd, 4,800 ? I think we had sold 2,300 by sat am, dont know how many corporate tickets or how many Rovers sold.

**HulaHoop** · 15/05/2011, 3:10 PM

Posted on our forum that attendance was 4798. We sold our 2800 allocation for the east stand and a handful of west stand returns from Dundalk, then if you add in the guests (press, sponsors, FAI heads, Setanta heads, Club officials etc) your looking at a Dundalk attendance of about 1800.

**harleyleeds** · 15/05/2011, 4:22 PM

Not wum. Was this not a much smaller crowd than anticipated? Alot stated that all but Tallaght too small (not wum) but 4800 would fit into any ground.

**Charlie Darwin** · 15/05/2011, 4:27 PM

Rovers' allocation sold out on Friday. Dundalk had a few returns from what I've read, but I think part of that is they had to return anything they hadn't sold last week. The empty seats appear to be those belonging to sponsors.

**White Horse** · 15/05/2011, 4:31 PM

Originally Posted by HulaHoop

Thought we fully deserved our win. First 30 minutes Dundalk went at it hell for leather and we struggled to get out of our half for long periods of the opening half hour and had to dig deep to keep them at bay. When Dundalk inevitably couldn't keep that pace going and dropped off a bit towards the end of the first half we played our football and dominated the rest of the game creating numerous chances, hit the woodwork three times and ultimately scored two well deserved goals. O'Neill's 4-2-3-1 worked very well against Dundalk's midfield which is where the game was won. By the time we sacrificed a midfielder for a striker to go 4-4-2 Dundalk's midfielders were too tired to take advantage of there being one less Rovers midfielder to deal with. Tactically excellent from the much criticised O'Neill.

Agree with most of that. The game was decided in midfield.

**passinginterest** · 15/05/2011, 5:37 PM

Originally Posted by Charlie Darwin

Rovers' allocation sold out on Friday. Dundalk had a few returns from what I've read, but I think part of that is they had to return anything they hadn't sold last week. The empty seats appear to be those belonging to sponsors.

Not quite, I picked up an East stand ticket from the ticket booth about 4 o'clock on Saturday, there was at least 50 or 60 more tickets in the bundle as well as the 300 or so West stand tickets. I think the scare stories about it being a sell out probably had a negative effect as people didn't bother trying on the day.

Excellent game I though, especially with the wind blowing so hard. Very controlled performance from Rovers against the wind and had the better chances throughout. Dundalk play some nice football too and their fans contributed to a very good atmosphere.

**mypost** · 15/05/2011, 5:54 PM

Originally Posted by White Horse

The organisation was shambolic.

People standing on stairwells and walkways. It was dangerous.

A lot of the empty seats were reserved for the FAI or Setanta. It gave a very misleading impression of how many people were there.

Nothing to do with organisation. They weren't all Setanta reserved seats. I have my reserved seat in that stand, and whilst it was taken yesterday, there were loads of others around there that were not, there was even one Dundalk fan sitting alone further down, with no-one anywhere near him.

Simply too many people wanted to be in the same section of the ground, which while understandable to an extent, is dangerous and normal in this league.

**dong** · 15/05/2011, 8:01 PM

Originally Posted by mypost

Nothing to do with organisation.

Simply too many people wanted to be in the same section of the ground.

So it was due to poor organisation..
If it was organised properly then it wouldn't matter where people wanted to sit, they'd be told where thay had to go.
Same thing happened in the Showgrounds against Waterford two seasons ago and that was also because of poor organisation.

**born2bwild** · 15/05/2011, 8:35 PM

Originally Posted by dong

Don't really rate him as a manager either.

That's what I was getting at...why not?

**mypost** · 15/05/2011, 8:44 PM

Originally Posted by dong

So it was due to poor organisation..
If it was organised properly then it wouldn't matter where people wanted to sit, they'd be told where thay had to go.

Unreserved seating means you can sit where you like. They did. If people won't move, nothing you can do about it.

**oriel** · 15/05/2011, 9:57 PM

These figures dont add up, appears our final sales were around 2,000. If you take 200 sponsors, this leaves 2,600 rovers max. Their side was almost full, but not completely. I have to say I was very surprised as an effectively home game for Rovers, this game did not sell out.

On the football side of things, it is hard to see how anyone can come close to Rovers at the moment, I think we will challenge them, but this wont be for around 2 years, the after 'party' at the youth development centre in oriel park may have a signal for the future, most of the indoor pitches now installed, another 2 bars open, hopefully these sources can generate some talent in the years to come.

**Boots9** · 15/05/2011, 10:22 PM

Originally Posted by oriel

These figures dont add up, appears our final sales were around 2,000. If you take 200 sponsors, this leaves 2,600 rovers max. Their side was almost full, but not completely. I have to say I was very surprised as an effectively home game for Rovers, this game did not sell out.

The east stand was sold out and just a handful of the west stand tickets that were given to us then were sold.