Team by team guide to all the team challenging for the Offaly Intermediate Football Championship

BALLINAGAR

Manager – Benny O'Brien;

Selectors – Brendan Cuskelly and Dermot Cuskelly;

Captain – Geordi O'Meara;

Retirements/Long term injuries – None;

New players – None;

Last year – Beaten by Erin Rovers in the quarter-final;

Star player – Morgan Tynan;

Prospects – On paper, Ballinagar should be title favourites but they haven't earned that rating yet. They have a lot of very good players, men who have played on various underage teams for Offaly in recent years. Morgan Tynan was on the Offaly senior football panel this year before opting out while rock steady defender, Diarmuid Finneran will have benefited hugely from his year there. Adam Strong was on the senior panel early in the season while Geordi O'Meara and Robbie Gallagher played on the Offaly U-20 team. No one else has this volume of county players at the right age at this grade and Ballinagar should be capable of winning. You can't trust them to do that but their title prospects are certainly as good as anyone. They were poor in their Division 3 league semi-final; defeat by Ferbane but you wouldn't want to over analyse that. A lot depends on Morgan Tynan – a brilliantly talented footballer with real potential, he can struggle for consistency. He has a point to prove after falling down the Offaly pecking order after doing well in the league in Antrim near the start of the year. Ballinagar won the junior football final a couple of years ago with him injured and are far from a one man team but Dylan Hyland and, more arguably, Morgan Tynan are possibly the most gifted players in this grade, along with Nathan Poland of Erin Rovers. Ballinagar are far from a one man team but if Tynan is player of the year or close to it, then they will be very close. Ballinagar need everything to go right for them but shouldn't be far away.