Bord na Mona man wrote:This article in the Offaly Indo might be of interest.
Published: Friday, 27th July, 2012 1:12pm
Can 'back to the future' approach bear fruit for Offaly hurling?
If there is one thing it's easy to agree on, it's that something has gone horribly wrong within Offaly hurling at underage level.
The senior team might be holding their ground at the fringes of the top ten and the senior ladies are breaking new ground with every passing week, so at adult level, there are some positive aspects to the current state of affairs, something that can't be said about the county's football counterparts. However once we look closer at the state of underage games, hurling is clearly the poor relation of the two codes. Under-21 and minor results have been appalling for several years while, at academy level, the stated goal of competitiveness against representative sides from Kilkenny and Dublin looks to be as distant as ever.
The advent of an under-13 "First Time Hurling" tournament is one step that has been taken and Offaly Coaching Officer Pat Cleary spoke to the Offaly Independent about the tournament, which is being run in memory of the late Colin Dunne of Shamrocks, and what he hopes it will achieve.
"When Offaly were successful in the 1980s and 1990s, we did so playing a fast brand of hurling, moving the ball quickly and into space. A lot of people think we should never have gone away from that, so we're trying to move back in that direction. We want to do something meaningful and while a lot of people have talked about trying to return to what was the traditional style of hurling, not a lot has been done in that regard. Hopefully this will be the first step in the right direction".
Stylish ground hurlers like Johnny Pilkington were always central to this particular style of play and the Birr midfielder is now a big part of the drive to implement this new style as the county's hurling co-ordinator. Cleary also feels that some inspiration should be taken from the Birr club teams that won All-Irelands when using this approach, with Pilkington at the heart of their team.
"Birr won four club All-Irelands playing a fast and economical brand of hurling and some of those were quite recent. This style has always worked for Offaly since Dermot Healy first implemented it and we still feel that it's the best way of beating Kilkenny teams. Even when Galway were successful, I feel their best games coincided with when Joe Cooney was playing at centre-forward. He brought other players into the game and moved the ball, instead of carrying it as was normally the Galway method."
At a time when other counties are studying the game and employing completely different tactics based on securing and retaining possession, it's an extremely courageous and potentially risky tactic to be gambling on a style that hasn't really worked at senior inter-county level for a long time. Dublin and Tipperary both actively discourage first time or ground hurling at academy level, instead asking players to concentrate on the basics of first, getting control of the sliotar, before finding either a colleague or the goalposts with every delivery.
Other counties have also completely changed their approach. Clare handpassed the sliotar more than they struck it with the hurl this year, and while teams like Galway and Tipperary play a more direct style, every pass is still aimed at the hand of a colleague. Most inter-county players would argue that space is at a premium now due to increased levels of fitness, but Cleary's view is that Offaly need to get back to using space.
"It's not that we want to see lads blindly hitting the ball along the ground to a player on the opposite team. This endeavour is not about ground hurling, it's about fast hurling. We accept that it will take a while for players to get used to it, but our view is that if the ball is moved quickly and into space, there won't be as much bunching and it won't be as important which team is bigger or stronger.
"We still want our lads to attack the ball and to win it, but we want them to move it quickly as soon as they get it. I know every other county is going one way at the moment with more and more emphasis on strength and conditioning and they can do that if they want. It's not that we're ignoring strength and conditioning either - that's very much part of our plan. However the policy we've taken in coaching and games is to do something a little bit more distinctive and to get back to the approach that suits Offaly best."
On the face of it, there is merit in the idea of trying to identify what tactical approach will beat sides like Kilkenny and Dublin in Leinster instead of just mimicking what they do.
However, at a time when the rules of the game are being interpreted very liberally, with a lot of advantage being played in the spirit of "letting the game flow", any approach that prioritises the area of the field where action takes place as opposed to who is in control of the sliotar at any time is always going to be high risk.
Offaly's success in the '80s and '90s came at a time when technical fouls like illegal handpasses and overcarrying were immediately punished, and when scores from long range were occasional rather than frequent. The new lighter ball has resulted in midfielders and half-backs popping over points from halfway, so conceding possession anywhere outside of the opposition '45 means that you could concede a score instantly. All of these factors have fed into counties developing their current tactical systems and policies.
Only time will tell if the "back to the future" approach being deployed in Offaly is capable of bucking that trend.
http://www.offalyindependent.ie/sport/r ... ing-/print