QuoteKiki beat you to it - but at least had the good grace to include a "not entirely serious" smiley!
Rovers have apparantly signed up the full squad from this year minus Joey O Brien but adding Jack Byrne and almost new signings in Farrugia and Sean Kavanagh who missed almost the whole season.
Derry have already added 3 big signings McEleney, Duffy and Patching and apparently McClean on the way.
IF you take it that these clubs cant sign many more Dundalk will be able to offer reasonable wages to most of their team that should match the offers of Pats/Bohs/Sligo. Unless guys have options in the UK of course.
Add in a few players like Massey and Mountney who would be happy to sign back to play under SOD and that looks like a very competitive side. Could SOD persuade Forrester to move ??? Forrester spoke unbelievably highly of him on a Podcast i was listening to and he could be the new DFC McEleney.
They need Hoooooban to sign back as priority 1 2 and 3
Last edited by sbgawa; 01/12/2021 at 12:58 PM.
Kiki beat you to it - but at least had the good grace to include a "not entirely serious" smiley!
Relying on Kavanagh is a risky policy though, the fella cant catch a break with injuries.Originally Posted by sbgawa
Agree but hopefully the latest surgery works the cure for him, Farrugia and Cotter are the options on LWB so there is cover if he go's again.
I noticed Bradser had him playing in a number 6 roll a few times before he got injured which was interesting, he did talk about him in an interview as being a player who was smart enough to play anywhere
Ditto Farrugia in fairness.
I think it's still fair to say you're looking at Rovers/Derry for the top two spots next season. Bohs/Pat's/Sligo/Dundalk - Dundalk are probably in the weakest position of those four; they're similar-sized clubs but Dundalk have less Euro cash for their budget (assuming Bohs saved something from this year), and of course they've to build a squad from scratch.
So they'll probably be in for the same players and should be eyeing 3rd-6th next season. Which of course doesn't factor in that the LoI is rarely that simple...
We are goosed, essentially building from scratch whilst in the Premier Division. If UCD hold onto Kerrigan and Whelan we'll be favourites to go down.
The Dundalk squad from 2021 were probably the second best team in the league but were a shambles due to Mangt changes and off Field stuff.
They almost snuck 4th place by stringing a few wins together and had a theoretical chance of 4th on the final day.
Take out Duffy (McEleny who missed a chunk of the season and Patching ditto) and if they retain most of the rest and add a few like Massey / Mountney , Darragh Burns that is a team that can challenge. Duffy is a huge loss but the core of a really god team is there
Rovers will be very short odds to retain the title again. All our rivals are in a mess or rebuilding and Derry still need to make a team out of their signings - don't forget Duffy, McEleney and even Patching, who did perform well in Derry, were part of a dire Dundalk side this year so zero guarantees there. Rovers will probably add a centre-half to replace Joey and ideally Collie Whelan even if it is mid-season.
No One Likes Us, We Don't Care
I'd say both will be gone by the summer. There's players coming through to replace them - Evan Caffrey for example - but obviously those two alone would make things very difficult for us next year.
We did at least show in the cup that we can compete (beat Longford and Shels; nearly beat Waterford and of course did beat them in the playoffs) and given how close 4th-9th was last year, then that gives us hope.
But I'd be surprised if we didn't go straight back down tbh. Fewer 10-1 defeats than last time would be nice.
How many players do Pats have under contract (majority of squad also out of contract)? Or Bohs who are set to lose key players? It leaves Sligo, who are in a good position (how good is Kenny), but not so long ago they were calling for Buckley to be gone, and they seemed limited too.
Dundalk arent so far behind as you think. They will also have a bigger budget than the others, despite no European football. O'Donnell would not have left Pats for nothing. There will be resources for him in Dundalk above Pats (which is the real reason why he would leave on the footballing side of things). The new owners are no slouches. The have LOI experience (Fastfix), and money (and maybe connections?) from Statsport. Going out and getting SOD is a great statement of intent.
Why would you be adding Daragh Burns ? Still under contract at Pats from what I’ve read. The two I’d be most concerned about losing are Forrestor and Lee Desmond. Keep them and at least we have something to work with.
Out for a spell, got neglected, lay on the bench unselected.
More just as an example tbh ive no idea of his contract but i see him as a younger version of Duffy who DFC need to replace.
The current DFC team minus the 3 lads (Duff / McEl, Patch) + Forrester (to use your example) ,+ Burns looks like a title challenging squad to me.
A settled Rovers + JB have enough to be considered favs but if we lose Mandroiu in Jan as rumoured to Celtic that wont help
https://www.the42.ie/odonnell-dundal...=twitter_short
Clancy talking to Pats now,just need Vinny to sign with Drogheda now and the perfect merry go round is complete!!
Irish by birth ,Harps by the grace of god.
Is it really that good?
They've no keeper. I presume all the foreign lads - Nattested, Zahibo, Han, Ben Amar, maybe Jurkovskis - are going to leave, for cost and/or crapness reasons. McMillan and Gartland (who's 35 and coming back from a bad injury) are on the PFAI list, although that rarely means too much in fairness. But you're left with (going off wiki) -
GK - none
DF - Boyle, Leahy, Cleary, Dummigan
MF - Stanton, Sloggett (but was he not linked with Derry too?), Murray, Kelly
FW - Hoban, Junior
Plus some youth players who are probably hit and miss like youth players everywhere. And that's assuming that all the above can still fit into a world without an 80k/week wage bill (or whatever it was)
So you've a decent 2-11, but no keeper and no strength in depth at all. Adding Forrester/Burns will help a bit, but there's still 5/6 players to be added.
One thing for certain is that it's going to be an interesting pre-season, and we're only three days into it!
Last edited by pineapple stu; 01/12/2021 at 1:42 PM.
I am enjoying the crazy conspiracies of Pats fans on Twitter.
Kind of funny me talking up Dundalk but i just think the core is there and SOD will add to it.
Other than jurkovskis none of the others are a loss and maybe add Murphy from Waterford as GK...admittedly strength in dept is an issue but the likes of Massey at Drogs cant be expensive and id be shocked if he doesn't end up at DFC.
Your right though its going to be interesting.
Any insight into Whelan to Rovers ?? Andy Myler was very complementary to Rovers in an interview i heard a couple of months ago "only club in Ireland doing things properly in terms of Whelan" so sounds hopeful that UCD would see Rovers as the preferred route with timing the issue
Yeah I mean when you lay it out like that, it's not a bad spine - although only Boyle is actually in contract and any of the others could move still. Lot of work to be done though, and it seems easier to have stayed at Pat's, added one or two players, and gone on a Euro run. Even let someone else do the rebuild and move at a more opportune time. I get the Dundalk link, for sure, but from a cold calculating career view it seems a step backwards.
Whelan (so I've heard anyway!) is with us till the summer and then moving on. Rovers sound likely, but you never know. Someone in England may come in of course. Not sure about Kerrigan - possibly back to Sligo, but Rovers could be an option there too.
SOD obviously sees a better opportunity of winning a league title in the next few years with Dundalk than Pats, besides re-build or not, both clubs have the same amount of players under contract, very few, now admittedly Pats are the stronger not just for winning for the cup, but for comfortably finishing second in the league, however all will depend on players staying / going.
Dundalk got over 3k at the last league game, so proves there is still a good support core, albeit a huge lift that day with the takeover announced a few days before.
Also a good core of players will remain, however SOD will want to put his stamp on it and re-build that's for sure, but overall its a good appointment and I expect this will work out quite successful too in time.
#DundalkFC - First Irish club to win an away game in Europe (1963), first Irish club to win points in a group stage in Europe (2016).
He may have said it but I will bet he was just being nice. It is a bigger job than St Pats - how you want to define 'bigger job' is a debate in itself. As for people saying there are no 'big clubs' in Ireland thats rubbish, its relative and Linfield are huge!!Kiki beat you to it - but at least had the good grace to include a "not entirely serious" smiley!
Even if we do appoint O'Donnell, there is no guarantee it will work, it takes the right blend of minds and maybe Matthews was a key part of that. Pats could find that Clancy is a more astute coach again. It certain livens up some rivalry for next season.
SOD could come to UCD and have the same chance of a league title tbh.
3k at the last league game is decent, but let's see how it holds up if there's another season of mid-table. LoI history tells us how these things tend to go!
But certainly Dundalk fans have to be happy with the appointment; that's for sure.
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