The simple truth is that the Sligo game was a nothing match…we were never going to lose and we knew that.

Yes the defence was a bit open but it will be better when we play against Galway.

The Galway game is when we can critically analyse this team…not before then.

I remember us putting in poor displays against London in 1996 and 2011 and yet should have won the AA in 96 and beat Cork, then reigning champions, in 2011.

One key issue with the team is we have only one natural scoring forward in RoD - that’s our biggest issue.

The reality is Kerry deservedly start favourites for the AI as they have the strongest looking squad..however we need to understand that our squad is every bit as good as the rest e.g. Galway and Donegal are no better than us. Our squad is every bit as good and it would be a mistake to think otherwise.

In truth it’s over to management now to prepare the team for a good championship…and in my view if they don’t then it’s P45 time. 3 strikes and you’re out!

Btw, we like to see the 70s as a dark decade with no Connacht titles…but we’ve only managed two in the last 10 years ourselves. Not good enough!

For as long as I've been watching Mayo, they seem to play up to level of opposition. That why over years, we become everyone's second favour team. Don't often see Kerry toiling it out with second/ third division teams, and seem to do it without too much fuss. But that Mayo way, think Mayo need to build themself up emotionally, for the battle ahead. 2013, was last year, Mayo destroyed teams on the way to all-Ireland final, no drama, just got the job done. Wish we could be more like "13

Smaller margin thank god then 2021 in the Autumn Mayo will plan for a 1st London game since 2016 in 2026.

I would not describe the sligo game as a no match. One plus from the game is that AOS and Carney can interchange positions without any loss of tempo. If managed correctly, it should mean we get the 70 mins out of O'Shea.
But on the negative side it highlighted that we still have work to do on retaing possession from kickouts.
The outstanding feature of Mayo football over the years is that they somehow manage to let inferior opposition back into games.
We are far from everyone second favourite team, our failure to win finals, put paid to that myth. There was many a neutral crying 'not mayo again' when the league finalists became known. Our defeat by Tyrone put paid to any sympathies anyone might have for us.
We got ourselves into that mess and we have to navigate ourselves out of it.

Interesting piece of info on the latest Ah Ref Podcast.

I think everyone had taken it for granted that if it were to be a Mayo v Roscommon Connacht final that it would be played in Castlebar, but ,in fact it would be played in the Hyde .

The lads on the pod know there stuff, so I'm not doubting them.

Hiding to nothing is how I'd describe that game. A hammering, and sure it's only Sligo etc etc. It's shit or get off the pot time soon enough. Is it a case of mgmt deliberately lowering expectations? It's showtime anon.

Hard to see how that’s the case, Paddyjoe, seeing as we played them not once but twice at Hyde Park in last year’s Championship. The first of those was a Connacht Championship tie so that would suggest we’d host a provincial fixture against them this year if that comes to pass. Would be interesting to see what logic there is for why this might not be the case.

@Willie Joe: There's a separate rotation for finals independent of the normal provincial rotation.

That said... There was still a slip there by Enda.

We played home in '04 and away in '11 against them in Finals, so it'll be a MacHale Park Final whichever of Galway or Roscommon win.

I’ve now had it confirmed from an impeccable source that a Mayo/ Roscommon final, should it happen this year, will indeed be played in Castlebar.

Sorry folks, mislead on the venue. Definitely Castlebar. Note to self, double check next time

Amazingly, it will be the first Connacht final in Castlebar for 11 years! (Should we beat Leitrim!)

Technically last Connacht final in castlebar was in 2016 although we weren’t involved

Amazing stats there. I did seem to remember something about finals v Ros being different, but TSU, the oracle, has it chapter and verse. What a blog!

And while you're there TSU, could you give us an overall perspective on pace? Is the team pacey would you say? When Donegal made their changes at half time in the final match, we couldn't adjust for about ten or fifteen minutes such was the difference in pace. Has the addition of Thornton, Coggins, Neary, Dawson, Morahan made us more pacey? Diarmuid's return won't increase that variable.

1985 - it was more recent than that: the 2023 final was also played there. It was an easy one to forget, as Galway ran out easy winners that day over Sligo.

I completely forgot about the 2023 final .strangely I can’t remember anything about that game

Apologies, left out the crucial detail of the finals featuring us! We've played Connacht finals in three different venues since then but none in Castlebar. I make it our longest gaps since 1966 between finals featuring Mayo in Castlebar.

@Catcol, there's pace off the mark like Tommy Conroy and Jack Coyne. Then there's long stride pace like Jack Carney and Diarmuid who if they trained for it would run good 400m times.
Diarmuid does have pace just not over five yards. We're a pacey enough side with everyone available.

@catcol: Interesting question, though struggling to figure how to frame an answer to it.

As @JP mentioned you've lads with those punishing 5 yard bursts (Coggins or even an Aido when combined with his power), versus lads with high acceleration over 15-20m (Neary or a Conroy) and then the lads that can hit a high full tilt but can take a little longer to get there (Reid or a Tuohy). When you throw in the combination of strength & power (Aido runs over more lads than he ever ran around) with pace and the ability to isolate lads to punish on fielding or pace, it can throw a lot of different challenges in the mix.

- The real pace in the side would probably be Durcan, Conroy (questions over both with injury recovery - so big caveats mentioning either there), McLaughlin, Callinan, Hession & Neary.
- RO'D, Flynn, Ruane, McBrien, McHugh, Coyne, Kelly, Akram & Morahan (I'd imagine - sometimes watching sprints back in the day they'd go way different than you'd imagine watching the lads playing games. Especially the bigger lads can be deceptively fast without ever looking like they're trucking) off the lads mentioned, but still pacey enough to have an upper hand in a large number of their match-ups.

That's ~8-10 starters mentioned for +decent pace and plenty of the lads not mentioned (Carney, McHale, DO'C, Irwin, Tuohy, Towey) that'd be close on their heels depending on the distances being covered.

In defence:
Enough options to have decent match-ups against most sides (in either direction), though obviously we'd always love more. Losing a single option though can have dramatic results. Someone like Enda drops out of a match-day 15 and suddenly instead of being on top for 5 & breaking even on 1 match-up at the back you're suddenly losing 4 & breaking even on 2 kinda thing.

That said, we've tended to hit our problems with the lads running from deep (be it Lally the last day or lads like Bugler, Paudie or Ó Baoill) managing to stretch & exploit our system, rather than just lads being caught on unfavourable matchups (Stephen caught once or twice there during the league or Mattie/Niall caught a little flat-footed the last day, but not a fundamental issue we've faced consistently).

A combination of closing the space (sometimes pace related, often more athleticism & work-rate as the drivers) and stopping the runner with a head of steam (making sure the 'fair' body block makes enough contact to slow the play and hopefully turn them backwards rather than letting the lad take you on the shoulder) a bigger challenge for us to be working on I'd imagine rather than simply looking to get more pace on the field for better head to head footraces.

In offence:
Hard to assess too much there given our style of play hasn't been seeking to maximise moving at pace (be that the players or the ball) too much.

Neary's running has caused havoc, in the pre-season McLaughlin's running was outstanding (still doesn't look to be near 100% since the injury niggles), the odd time we've seen Hession free to go at pace he's produced results, RO'D tends to be jinks & dummies rather than using his raw pace, but has plenty of both in his locker and always asking questions when he does open the legs... but more often than not we've turned down a fast running transition or kicking to allow 1v1 races inside for that more controlled lateral build up.

Playing devil's advocate you might say perhaps energy saving at the time if we weren't at 100% physically or perhaps giving us more time to face deep set defences (an aspect we've struggled with for years) to work on our tactics there... but I'm not sure I'd be able to talk myself into believing any of those. It seems to be the current plan, despite the obvious downsides it brings of limiting Aido or Ryan getting on 1v1s where they can excel and cause so many problems. That said, the pace a Neary/Conroy/Durcan (still a little surprised we didn't see young McLaughlin get some minutes given the pace he'd bring - though a year or two more S&C to bring the physicality to go with it yet) can bring to an attack means they're forced to potentially compromise on selections of their own (just like Aido's power causes most sides huge headaches) so lots of benefits even if it's being used relatively sparingly.

TSU - thanks so much; that's a powerful analysis of our strengths in relation to pace, and also why we need to be firing on all cylinders - having Eoin and Enda performing to the max would be huge for us.

So much detail there TSU - your posts are so knowledgeable and informative. Thanks too JP for those insights into sprints and middle distance.

Strange how no tickets on sale for next weeks semi finals. The GAA really dont help themselves

TsuDhoNim is AI. Has to be :)

Are we likely to see our captain and Tommy Conroy play this year?

How do you know the connaught final will be between Mayo and Galway? It could be Mayo and Roscommon??

@Sheila

Rossies do have a good have a good chance bit honestly think Galway have toomuch for them.

@Yew_tree

Heard McStay said Durcan back in team training and was flying around which is great to hear hoping he makes some kind of an appearance v Leitrim

If you watch mayo over the years, you might say we dont have the forwards etc, we've heard it all before and it's partly true but the one glaring omission is a creative 11..since the great C McD, one of the finest kickers of the pigskin we've seen we haven't had a creator..imagine how he'd thrive pumping ball into the forwards now with the rule changes. Anyway, point is look at the teams who've won all irelands..always had a very good 11, dublin rotated alot I understand and didn't have a particular set 11, but Kilkenny , connolly etc did a job there . Look at paudie C in that role, mcguigan from Tyrone was very good there, now more than ever that creator role is vital, do we have a player who's first thought is head up, bang it into the ff line as the space opens up? I'm struggling to think of one. The last player who cud pick a pass was kev mcloughlin really.

Yes Clare, I'd like to see paddy back ASAP.. badly need his drive from half back..has probably been one of our best players last 7 or 8 seasons but injury has been a curse to him the poor fella, great man to kick a point or 2 most games too aswell as a man marking job. Have too many similar players around the middle 8 to be in the mix however.

Yew Tree, hopefully, but I wouldn't be overly optimistic. Knees are tricky creatures.

Would think Paddy will make appearance next day out.

It would be great to see the 2 lads make the bench against Leitrim... probably a must at this stage if they are to figure in any meaningful way later on, but as someone pointed out last week they are not going to pick up where they left off. It will be just the first step in a gradual process (hopefully)back to fitness.
Running around like a spring lamb in training is one thing....when there's several fox's hunting you down, it's a different ball game.

U17s leading by 13 at half time and as good as into the semi final v Galway

Really impressive evening for the lads.

Holmes, Hession, May, Kelly & Jordan's aerial dominance gave us a huge platform for the evening. On both our own restarts and the Sligo kicks we looked a real threat. Whenever we didn't get the direct pass off quickly, the pace & power of the running game (mostly the same lads with added support from Flanagan, Murphy, O'Donnell & Coghill) caused huge problems for the opposition too. A few too many threats coming from a few too many areas for Sligo to stay on top of. With Cian May adding in a beauty of a 2-pointer from play just to add to the threats they faced.

At the back Coghill, Tighe & Flanagan (could easily include all the lads - team performance more than individuals tonight) put in some ferocious blocks and won great turnovers.

Not a great night for the Sligo lads on the scoreboard, but they'll take huge positives from the performances of James Donoghue, Brian Meehan, Ryan Lang & Adam Feeney. The first two in particular put in outstanding performances, not easy when playing on a side being dominanted around the middle 1/3rd they were playing in. Names you'd expect we might see plenty more of in the future.

Interesting to see mamy big teams running their squad for early provincial games. Mayo, Armagh and Galway already. Realisation that they don't matter a damn and maybe that resting up and getting ready for group stage is the real show in town.

Has any sporting organisation inflicted so much self-harm as the GAA? Is there any competition run that is not severly damaged? League, provincials, minor and u20 degraded, railway cup....

@Pod Fan: I wouldn't agree it's an illustration of "don't matter a damn". The fact that the 3 sides you mentioned all won (relatively comfortably, even in Mayo's case the scoreline looked a lot closer than the game did) suggests more a calculated call on getting minutes to deepen the panel experience (more important than ever) without sacrificing results.

Without any significant upsets (to limit permutations excluding small upsets for Roscommon/Monaghan/Tyrone too - they've all got realistic shots but just swing sides between 1st/2nd/3rd seeds) we'll be looking at something like:

1st seeds: Dublin, Kerry, Mayo/Galway, Donegal/Armagh
2nd seeds: Kildare/Louth, Clare/Tipp, Mayo/Galway, Donegal/Armagh
3rd seeds: Monaghan, Roscommon, Tyrone, Derry
4th seeds: Meath, Cavan, Cork, Down

I'm not sure if there's anyone in the country that would say getting a 1st seeding doesn't matter a damn.

It's a pretty huge advantage, just as finishing 1st in the group stage is. Lots not to like about the current structure, but the rewards/benefits for winning games isn't among them. If anything, you gain a little too much from a Provincial win &/or topping your group.

Hopefully the championship fires up soon.
A lot of games very poor

Beautiful meath not looking very beautiful so far

It's important in it's own right to win a connacht title, it's important to be a seed 1 in group for home advantage, and it's important for the confidence of Team/ management going forward into group stages.
@ TDN, does seed 1 have home adv against seed 2 and 3 or is it seed 2 and 4?

@Ontheditch: 1st seeds play home to a 3rd seed in R1, away to a 4th seed in R2 & neutral for a 2nd seed in R3 of the groups.

Thanks for clarification. At worst we will get in as seed 2. Any seed 3 team could trip us up on a good day.

Tyrone won't be easy beat this year..when they get it right they are the one team who don't care about anyone..without Canavan today..9 or 10 different scorers..Kilpatrick and Kennedy 2 big units and powerful runners in the middle..Mccurry and Mcshane playing well..solid back line. Will be very dangerous

Lets not get carried away about Tyrone they beat Cavan who we hammered last year

@Larry David yeah true ..I know he won't be his 100% best but a half fit Durcan would be a big boost.

Who knows maybe his best years are ahead of him like Andy moran and with his character & resilience I think he will still have good years ahead ..

Hopefully Paddy and Tommy see game time V Leitrim

Tyrone, will be in mix. Good Midfield, more natural than ours. Best goal keeper in country. 3 forward that would walk onto most teams. And Tyrone bread and butter is been defensively sound. Not saying they win it, but as off now, I say well inside top four in country. Have Kerry, Dublin and Donegal ahead of them.

Galway better than Kerry or Dublin and beat Donegal last year.

Jr, Galway No. 5 for me, and have Mayo and Armagh, nearly joint 6th. Last year Armagh won it, doesn't make them best team this year. But still a fine team

@JR agree would have Dubs above kerry.

Still think Donegal are dark horses and will go far .

Tyrone yes let's not get carried away it was Cavan they beat but they are good especially when the Canavan brothers are playing.

Armagh are getting better each time will have a good chance .

Ourselves it's hard to know where we are at until after Connacht if we beat Galway in connacht final if they get passed the Rossies that would give us such a confidence boost .

It's still wide open and there's no stand off team Kerry or Dubs are not unbeatable .

Clare, I agree Donegal will have a big championship but they certainly aren't dark horses. Only behind Kerry with the bookies and widely touted by most pundits. MAYO 7th favs at 22/1 which on all known or shown evidence is probably about right.
Though I don't think they'll win it Monaghan could be a nightmare 3rd seed. They've really embraced the new rules and 2pt frees are made for them with Beggan nonchalantly knocking them over.

Predicted Team for Leitrim:

Reape
Coyne McHugh Hession
Kelly McBrien E McLaughlin
Ruane D O'Connor
Neary McHale Flynn
A O'Shea Carney R O'Donoghue

Not sure where Eoghan McLaughlin is injury wise, but he can make a big difference for us imo and needs game time to straighten out his technique.

I think we'll tog strong. Anyone we "rest" for this will go into a Connacht Final without a game in 4 weeks.

Will be in Cork until Thursday so wanted to get the Sligo/Mayo U20 game on Connacht GAA but they have the Roscommon/Leitrim U20 game and both U17 games but not our one. Anybody know if it's being televised somewhere else?

@JoeG: Not televised, but TG4 are streaming it on their YouTube channel. I'm sure it'll be embedded here on the blog as usual when the time comes.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=drAz0Sv4iK4

@JoeG yeah fair enough probably not dark horses ..!

Yeah guess 22/1 for us is fair enough after our performances so far ..

It will indeed, TsuDhoNim. I’m going to the game and we’ll have a Final Whistle pod on it as well.

To get the most out of AOS, I would interchange him with Carney at midfield/ ff. That way he could take breathers when required by going from midfield to ff. We would get the full 70 mins from him.
Murphy did it very effectively all the time with Donegal and it's even more possible to do it now with three players staying up.
DOC to lead the forwards at 11 imo

Much appreciated TsuDhoNim. The first U20 mayo game I can't make so would hate to miss it. BTW I believe this will be our toughest test so far.

@JoeG: Yeah. It'll be a tough one alright.

They've a lot of size & power around the middle, along with pace scattered throughout. Niland and Rooney (only just coming back to fitness) give them that bit of quality (can't imagine their forward line will be as wayward as they were the last day against Galway - where both sides struggled for efficiency) and in Ross they've a real class act with a bit of everything to his game charging forward from 6. Expect he'll make big impacts for them at senior shortly, like Mulligan has in the last couple of years.

That said, I'd still hope we've that little bit too much in our inside line for them to handle and can do enough to blunt their threat at the other end. If we can stop them holding control of the middle third and punching through with runners (a big if) I'd fancy us to take this one.