“I don’t want to sound like Joe Brolly lads but these are 17-year-old young fellas”

Tough viewing.

The Carlow minors were defeated 1-13 to 0-2 by Kildare in their Leinster championship meeting on Wednesday night in front of their home Dr. Cullen Park crowd. The Carlow team began their evening with three sweepers, and despite trailing by seven points at half-time, incredibly they would come out in the second half with the exact same restrictive system. So as Kildare rained the long range points in over their heads, not only did they fail to raise a gallop in terms of a comeback bid, worse again, they didn't even try to. Kildare Now reporter Patrick Ward was at the game and he was heavily critical of the Carlow game-plan, claiming the game was a 'painful game of football to watch.' https://twitter.com/paddyward99/status/999373218275262469 The match came up for discussion on Thursday's GAA Hour Football Show and Colm Parkinson, Conan Doherty and Stevie McDonnell all chipped in on it. The worst thing about it all, for Colm Parkinson, is that Carlow's best players are being restricted by the rigid system, and therefore have no chance to showcase their talents.  

"When we were Laois minors, we hammered teams because we had a great team, but you'll see on those teams that we hammered, 'Jesus, they had a brilliant midfielder,' or 'the corner back gave Beano (McDonald) very little.'  "You'll always have three or four lads that are very good players. How the hell can the three or four good players on that Carlow team show the senior management or show the under-21 management that they're good players, playing that shite?

https://twitter.com/Carlow_GAA/status/999369415501238273 The second half sight of a Carlow player kicking a free 40 yards backwards was particularly disconcerting.

"In the second half, they get a free and the fella who was on the free kicked it 40 yards backwards to fellas they had back there. "What's the point of this? I don't want to sound like Joe Brolly lads but these are 17-year-old young fellas," said Wooly.

It should be all about enjoyment, about lads expressing themselves through these underage ranks.

"Learn the skills, learn the kicking. Become accomplished on all the skills of the game. Your good players can't even play, nobody can play. But instead of conceding 5-18 to 1-13, you end up scoring two points in a game, and what are your players thinking coming out of that game? Are they proud of that? They can't be," he said.

https://twitter.com/KildareGAA/status/999369282608877571 Stevie McDonnell was similarly critical of such a conservative approach to football, considering the players involved are only 17-year-old boys.

"When the motivation is only to stop the other team from playing, what is the point of playing, as a 17-year-old?" "What is the value in having three sweepers in any game whatsoever? The Carlow boys aren't going to have any enjoyment in that whatsoever."

The Armagh legend feels that it's the players who are paying for their manager's hard-lined ignorance.

"The reality is, there are some coaches and managers out there, that, even if they had 15 Colm Coopers, they'd still try to adapt this defensive style of football. It's ridiculous." "I've watched sweepers in the past and they haven't a clue in terms of a positional sense. They don't know what side of the field to cover when they see a play developing. Their head is all muddled up, those players would be better suited to just going and marking their men and play a game of football.

Conan Doherty was in complete agreement.

"We can talk about football an cry for it, but I just thought, what an idiot manager. When I read that, I wasn't bleeding for the future of the game, I was just like, that's really stupid. They didn't even try to react when they were down."

Don't scare the future stars away. You can listen to this chat and much more from Thursday's GAA Hour Show right here. https://soundcloud.com/sportsjoe-gaa-hour/colin-kelly-interview-sean-cavanagh-punditry-advice-for-young-players