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Wexford Hurling Thread

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Replying To ElGranSenor: "Yes but some form of 12-team national competition would be a fairer way of spreading the load" That was my initial proposal a few months back. Viking66 (Wexford) - Posts: 20799 - 05/10/2026 17:40:22 2696322 Link
Replying To StoreysTash: "If ever there was a worse idea (except the no-jeopardy Wexford champ of last year) than this 2-group Leinster championship, this one takes the biscuit. While Munster have a cut-throat, kill and be killed championship Leinster have a "let everybody take part", risk-free alternative which is leaving none of the Leinster counties fit for battle when we play them. The same is happening at underage and Leinster counties are falling further and further behind. The underage structures make no sense either. Its crazy that Leinster is allowing ourselves to be the development guinea pig for hurling. Whether or not there are more Leinster counties is neither here nor there. The Leinster championship was weak this year already, this will weaken it further. Its time to seperate provincial hurling from Liam McCarthy and open up underage championship to ensure the counties don't just play the same 4-5 counties year on year. The slide in Leinster is alarming and its partly our own fault but we're trying to sit between two stools - promoting hurling and winning things - and we're all losing out. At some point, Willie Maher and his team need to be asked is developing hurling solely the job of Leinster counties? While Munster counties hoover up All-Irelands at underage and adult levels." There is no way Leinster counties should accept this format. A less competitive format is only going to mean all Leinster counties continue to fall further behind Munster teams. I think its time we had serious think about our hurling competitions . Is it time we played Leinster round robin in end of Jan to April and top two play in the final instead of the league then play an All Ireland Championship round robin starting in April/May Im not sure what the solution is but we have to make sure the gap between Leinster and Munster does not grow any further Afinestick96 (Wexford) - Posts: 1147 - 06/10/2026 10:12:37 2696360 Link
Replying To Afinestick96: "There is no way Leinster counties should accept this format. A less competitive format is only going to mean all Leinster counties continue to fall further behind Munster teams. I think its time we had serious think about our hurling competitions . Is it time we played Leinster round robin in end of Jan to April and top two play in the final instead of the league then play an All Ireland Championship round robin starting in April/May Im not sure what the solution is but we have to make sure the gap between Leinster and Munster does not grow any further" Thats something along the lines of what I suggested, although you could keep the League and just do away with League finals if you made the Provincials knockout again. Munster wont accept that though. Viking66 (Wexford) - Posts: 20799 - 06/10/2026 10:54:26 2696374 Link
Replying To Afinestick96: "There is no way Leinster counties should accept this format. A less competitive format is only going to mean all Leinster counties continue to fall further behind Munster teams. I think its time we had serious think about our hurling competitions . Is it time we played Leinster round robin in end of Jan to April and top two play in the final instead of the league then play an All Ireland Championship round robin starting in April/May Im not sure what the solution is but we have to make sure the gap between Leinster and Munster does not grow any further" Word on the grapevine is that this thing is expected to absolutely sail through at Leinster Council level. It just about guarantees at least a quarter-final spot each year for all of the current top five (Kilkenny, Galway, Dublin, Offaly, Wexford). Only way any of them would miss out would be if they dropped all the way to seventh. The mid-tier counties (i.e. Kildare, Carlow, Laois, Westmeath, Antrim, etc.) apparently love the idea of how more of them will get to play in the "proper" Leinster Championship each year, with a quarter-final spot against one of the stronger teams being a real carrot on a stick for them. The counties it doesn't really affect (i.e. Louth, Longford, Wicklow) will be swayed by the wishes of those mid-tier counties. "Who are we to try stop them from having the hurling championship they want?" And then it'll have to go to Congress for a rule change, as structure of the Leinster Hurling Championship is set out in the overall Rule Book. And all the other counties/provinces there will go "well, if that's what Leinster wants......." Despite how we all see flaws in it, looks like it'll become reality all right. Pikeman96 (Wexford) - Posts: 4126 - 06/10/2026 11:36:29 2696379 Link
Replying To Viking66: "Thats something along the lines of what I suggested, although you could keep the League and just do away with League finals if you made the Provincials knockout again. Munster wont accept that though." Whatever happens id be worried if Leinster goes ahead with the new proposed format Afinestick96 (Wexford) - Posts: 1147 - 06/10/2026 11:47:21 2696385 Link
Replying To Afinestick96: "Whatever happens id be worried if Leinster goes ahead with the new proposed format" As an outsider peeping in it appears to be saying "we have a weak competition, let's add a few more and make it weaker" Seanfan (Roscommon) - Posts: 964 - 06/10/2026 12:47:20 2696396 Link
And here's how this will play out. Leinster counties will continue to get annihilated by Munster counties. As happened this year in All-Ireland series bar Cork bottling it again. Leinster gets weaker, weaker and weaker. We're all of a sudden 20 years since a Leinster county has won an All-Ireland. When are we as a province going to say "We cannot do all the hurling promotion while combining it with an act of self-sabotage. We've expanded our underage, and our senior championships and all we're doing is hurting our own chances of winning Leinster by accommodating counties without a snowballs chance in hell of winning an All-Ireland". The time to shout STOP is now. Its ruining everybody while the Munster counties laugh at us. We can't allow this to continue. StoreysTash (Wexford) - Posts: 2177 - 06/10/2026 15:20:07 2696418 Link
Replying To StoreysTash: "And here's how this will play out. Leinster counties will continue to get annihilated by Munster counties. As happened this year in All-Ireland series bar Cork bottling it again. Leinster gets weaker, weaker and weaker. We're all of a sudden 20 years since a Leinster county has won an All-Ireland. When are we as a province going to say "We cannot do all the hurling promotion while combining it with an act of self-sabotage. We've expanded our underage, and our senior championships and all we're doing is hurting our own chances of winning Leinster by accommodating counties without a snowballs chance in hell of winning an All-Ireland". The time to shout STOP is now. Its ruining everybody while the Munster counties laugh at us. We can't allow this to continue." There are bigger issues why the Leinster counties are falling behind the Munster counties and Galway. From Grassroots upwards. 1- standard of coaching- we have way less award 1 and award 2 level coaches than the Munster counties and Galway. 2- participation- despite having double the number of counties in Leinster than Munster have, we have way less hurlers. And even less lads who only really play hurling rather than multiple sports, especially soccer. 3- time at it- in general our hurlers spend less months of the year hurling at underage than is the case in Munster. This is changing here in Wexford over the last few years. 4- tradition- partly because of 2 above, and the fact that 2 above has applied through the history of the GAA, we have less parents who hurled at a decent level themselves, and practice with their own kids from a young age. 5- schools- Munster and Galway secondary schools generally take hurling more seriously, with the exception of Kierans, and GCC and Kilkenny CBS. There are no doubt other good reasons that Im can't think of right now, but to use a card playing analogy, if you have 5 bad cards it doesn't matter what order you put them in. Viking66 (Wexford) - Posts: 20799 - 06/10/2026 18:24:21 2696440 Link
Replying To Viking66: "There are bigger issues why the Leinster counties are falling behind the Munster counties and Galway. From Grassroots upwards. 1- standard of coaching- we have way less award 1 and award 2 level coaches than the Munster counties and Galway. 2- participation- despite having double the number of counties in Leinster than Munster have, we have way less hurlers. And even less lads who only really play hurling rather than multiple sports, especially soccer. 3- time at it- in general our hurlers spend less months of the year hurling at underage than is the case in Munster. This is changing here in Wexford over the last few years. 4- tradition- partly because of 2 above, and the fact that 2 above has applied through the history of the GAA, we have less parents who hurled at a decent level themselves, and practice with their own kids from a young age. 5- schools- Munster and Galway secondary schools generally take hurling more seriously, with the exception of Kierans, and GCC and Kilkenny CBS. There are no doubt other good reasons that Im can't think of right now, but to use a card playing analogy, if you have 5 bad cards it doesn't matter what order you put them in." Id add Marys Mullingar to that list of secondary schools, they are doing excellent work at hurling. Viking66 (Wexford) - Posts: 20799 - 07/10/2026 07:49:48 2696476 Link
@Viking how many times have you said on here "we did great in the Michael Foley / Arrabawn / etc" and "beat Tipp / lost to Cork / beat Clare / beat Limerick / were unlucky v Tipp / etc, etc". These are 14 and 15 year olds and we're matching them. But what's happening from then onwards, is we've got Leinster Minor and U20 championships that are not preparing us anywhere near as well as the Munster counties. While they are playing each other, we're playing Laois/Carlow/Kildare/etc. This is what is causing the massive gulf in standards and you can't expect to just be able to pick it up. I've seen a lot of Tipp minor and U20 matches in the past few years due to girlfriend having relations playing. These matches are a world apart from the matches in Leinster. That gap is never and can never be closed at senior level as long as we persist with a crazy system in Leinster which is sort of a "give everybody a game" mindset while the Munster counties tear strips off each other. We're all losing due to the dilution of the standards of our competitions and its time we shout stop here and insist that Willie Maher and his team do something about it. Imagine the crowds that will go to a Leinster championship with nothing on the line. The championship is on life support as it is, this might just be the final nail in the coffin. Sometimes in the GAA there is too much democracy and it becomes a bad thing if the Longford or Louth county board have an equal voice for a championship structure which will have no impact on them. StoreysTash (Wexford) - Posts: 2177 - 07/10/2026 11:14:48 2696496 Link
Replying To StoreysTash: "@Viking how many times have you said on here "we did great in the Michael Foley / Arrabawn / etc" and "beat Tipp / lost to Cork / beat Clare / beat Limerick / were unlucky v Tipp / etc, etc". These are 14 and 15 year olds and we're matching them. But what's happening from then onwards, is we've got Leinster Minor and U20 championships that are not preparing us anywhere near as well as the Munster counties. While they are playing each other, we're playing Laois/Carlow/Kildare/etc. This is what is causing the massive gulf in standards and you can't expect to just be able to pick it up. I've seen a lot of Tipp minor and U20 matches in the past few years due to girlfriend having relations playing. These matches are a world apart from the matches in Leinster. That gap is never and can never be closed at senior level as long as we persist with a crazy system in Leinster which is sort of a "give everybody a game" mindset while the Munster counties tear strips off each other. We're all losing due to the dilution of the standards of our competitions and its time we shout stop here and insist that Willie Maher and his team do something about it. Imagine the crowds that will go to a Leinster championship with nothing on the line. The championship is on life support as it is, this might just be the final nail in the coffin. Sometimes in the GAA there is too much democracy and it becomes a bad thing if the Longford or Louth county board have an equal voice for a championship structure which will have no impact on them." Agree with everything you said there. I think the proposed structure is going to make the gap between Munster and Leinster wider. At least the current structure there is jepordy although it isnt perfect id much rather keep it Afinestick96 (Wexford) - Posts: 1147 - 07/10/2026 13:05:40 2696509 Link
Replying To StoreysTash: "@Viking how many times have you said on here "we did great in the Michael Foley / Arrabawn / etc" and "beat Tipp / lost to Cork / beat Clare / beat Limerick / were unlucky v Tipp / etc, etc". These are 14 and 15 year olds and we're matching them. But what's happening from then onwards, is we've got Leinster Minor and U20 championships that are not preparing us anywhere near as well as the Munster counties. While they are playing each other, we're playing Laois/Carlow/Kildare/etc. This is what is causing the massive gulf in standards and you can't expect to just be able to pick it up. I've seen a lot of Tipp minor and U20 matches in the past few years due to girlfriend having relations playing. These matches are a world apart from the matches in Leinster. That gap is never and can never be closed at senior level as long as we persist with a crazy system in Leinster which is sort of a "give everybody a game" mindset while the Munster counties tear strips off each other. We're all losing due to the dilution of the standards of our competitions and its time we shout stop here and insist that Willie Maher and his team do something about it. Imagine the crowds that will go to a Leinster championship with nothing on the line. The championship is on life support as it is, this might just be the final nail in the coffin. Sometimes in the GAA there is too much democracy and it becomes a bad thing if the Longford or Louth county board have an equal voice for a championship structure which will have no impact on them." The coaching gap is happening before that. A good example for you. I went up to Belfield to see the u16A Michael Foley Cup games a couple months ago. We played Tipps u16As in the semifinal. We started well, and were I think around 6 points up after 20 minutes. They then dropped a sweeper back to fill the space we were getting joy from. Our lads, on the line and on the pitch, didnt seem to know how to play against a sweeper, and our spare man and others at the back didnt seem to know how to play with or as a sweeper either. By halftime Tipp had clawed back most of the deficit, and went on to win by around 7. I watched several training sessions this year up in Ferns. We didnt appear to do much tactical work with the lads at all. Most of what I saw was small sided games based stuff, good for developing Technical Proficiency, 1 of the 3 Ts, and Physical fitness, 1 of the 3 Ps. There were very few 15 aside full game sessions, and what there were seemed strictly 15 on 15, and the games werent frozen even once for coaches to correct/coach the lads when mistakes were made. And there didnt seem to be a huge amount of positive messaging/encouragement either. Communication on the pitch and from the line was poor enough tbh. As a county we dont have many Award 2 coaches overall compared to other counties, and there arent many involved in our Hurling development squads, there are actually more involved with our Football development squads. Team play and Tactical prowess are the other 2 of the 3 Ts in the OTu model, the basis of the Award 2 course, and Psychological Focus and Playing facts are the other 2 of the 3 Ps. Awareness of all 4 of these seemed lacking in what Ive seen of our development squads the last few years. So when the lads get to minor how are we supposed to get them up to speed with what all of the other counties are doing in a few weeks of training? A good example of this was last years minors. Our lads just didnt get what Richie Flynn wanted them to do at all, and we looked absolutely terrible on the pitch. Viking66 (Wexford) - Posts: 20799 - 07/10/2026 13:19:40 2696511 Link
Replying To Afinestick96: "Agree with everything you said there. I think the proposed structure is going to make the gap between Munster and Leinster wider. At least the current structure there is jepordy although it isnt perfect id much rather keep it" I agree too, but just a point about the "too much democracy", because there's a certain irony to be considered here. May well be bad that there's "too much democracy" if the likes of Longford and Louth have equal say right now on a hurling championship that doesn't even affect them or involve them. But if we're ever to get the sort of "real" All-Ireland Championship that many here propose, with mixed groups of Munster teams and Leinster teams, then we'd be relying to "too much democracy" to make it happen as well. Would require a change at Congress and you can be sure that at least five Munster counties would be absolutely 100% set against anything that might dilute the Munster Championship itself. But the rub is that every other county and the overseas delegations and everyone else with a vote there would have the same voting rights too. So as long we had enough of the likes of Fermanagh and Leitrim and New York and the Middle East supporting it, the five Munster counties wouldn't have a hope of stopping it. How's that for too much democracy???!!!! Pikeman96 (Wexford) - Posts: 4126 - 07/10/2026 13:40:16 2696514 Link
Good Counsel got a fair trimming in Junior Hurling a few days ago, lost to Kilkenny CBC by 3-18 to 1-08 ElGranSenor (Wexford) - Posts: 1572 - 08/10/2026 09:24:29 2696569 Link
Replying To ElGranSenor: "Good Counsel got a fair trimming in Junior Hurling a few days ago, lost to Kilkenny CBC by 3-18 to 1-08" Yes a good hiding .. however am I correct in saying they walked the First year hurling blitz in Ferns COE yesterday? MyOhMi (Wexford) - Posts: 385 - 08/10/2026 10:39:51 2696575 Link
Replying To ElGranSenor: "Good Counsel got a fair trimming in Junior Hurling a few days ago, lost to Kilkenny CBC by 3-18 to 1-08" Its not a great GCC Junior team this year. Heard they sent their 1st year A and B teams up to Ferns this year, after the distress sending their B and C teams up last year caused. Not surprised they walked it. Viking66 (Wexford) - Posts: 20799 - 08/10/2026 11:42:40 2696585 Link
Replying To MyOhMi: "Yes a good hiding .. however am I correct in saying they walked the First year hurling blitz in Ferns COE yesterday?" Don't not tbh, was only going off what has been up on Leinster GAA How much of that Counsel team would be KK? And aren't Rathnure supposed to be very good at U12/U13? How many of them would be on that Counsel team? ElGranSenor (Wexford) - Posts: 1572 - 08/10/2026 13:51:27 2696606 Link
Replying To ElGranSenor: "Don't not tbh, was only going off what has been up on Leinster GAA How much of that Counsel team would be KK? And aren't Rathnure supposed to be very good at U12/U13? How many of them would be on that Counsel team?" There were 11 starters up in Ferns on the GCC 1st year A team from Wexford. 5 Rathnure, 2 Cushinstown, 2 Gusserane, 1 Adamstown and 1 Horeswood. Alot of Wexford lads on the B team also. The A team beat Wexford CBS and Marys CBS well, and beat Peters also, who had also beaten Wexford CBS and Marys CBS. Viking66 (Wexford) - Posts: 20799 - 08/10/2026 18:28:22 2696637 Link
Replying To ElGranSenor: "Don't not tbh, was only going off what has been up on Leinster GAA How much of that Counsel team would be KK? And aren't Rathnure supposed to be very good at U12/U13? How many of them would be on that Counsel team?" There were 11 starters up in Ferns on the GCC 1st year A team from Wexford. 5 Rathnure, 2 Cushinstown, 2 Gusserane, 1 Adamstown and 1 Horeswood. Alot of Wexford lads on the B team also. The A team beat Wexford CBS and Marys CBS well, and beat Peters also, who had also beaten Wexford CBS and Marys CBS. Viking66 (Wexford) - Posts: 20799 - 08/10/2026 19:36:24 2696643 Link