Very interesting discussion, great idea, and well worth having it.

On the centre of excellence - I was talking to a fella recently, well clued-in at another County that has one, and his suggestion was better off scaling up maybe 2/3 mini centres at different strategic points in the Country that having one major one.

"What do you think we are doing Jim? We are building an airport" That is the attitude now required. Getting the right people and the plan is the problem.Good luck in your endeavours.

We’ve heard a lot in recent weeks about Kevin McStay giving a lifetime of service to Mayo Gaa and again on this podcast. From what I can see in the archives, he played a total of 33 games for Mayo over a 10 year period, including minor, U21 and senior. He managed the seniors for 3 years and had a stint with the U21s around 2000. He managed Ros minors and seniors plus St Bridget’s . Hardly a lifetime.

@Nephin to be fair to Kevin he was immersed in Mayo football from an early age and seemed destined to Play for his County. He grew up around the Legends of the 51 team which i remember reading about in a piece he wrote, he spoke passionately about Mayo and Gaelic football and it left me in no doubt that he was a true Gael and that he loves his County.

Oh I’m not disputing that at all, just talking about the actual number of years directly involved with Mayo.

Nephin, like a lot of things on line a lot of things can be blown up and dramatised.

InExile that seems to be a lot of people's consensus, the Ref podcast a month or two ago had talk on it.
Cost and practicality wise it makes more sense.

Think if you play minor , u 21, senior for Mayo and also manage them you have given a fair commitment to the county. Throw in an All Star, an All Ireland final appearance and a serious injury which forced him to finish his career at an early stage, then I don’t think it can be said that you haven’t done your county some serious service.

@Nephin that's fair enough, one thing that's interesting though after listening to the Pod with Joe Kernan saying he is past all that now as in management and saying it was different because it was 20 years ago. So i was thinking bar Mickey Harte there is not too many managers over 60 years of age and i always thought Kevin McStay seemed younger. Like other sports the age profile of Managers and coaches seems to be getting younger and looking at it from a Mayo point of view would we prefer somebody quite young but still experienced and do people think that would be best when it comes to development etc and maybe have a manager for a long run this time once progression is being made each year as regards style of play squad depth and young player development?

Nephin, In fairness, he played in a time when it was knock out championship at all grades, so racking up appearances was not done easily.
Plus, he did pick up some serious injuries along the way

Nephin I agree with your point that Kevin Mcstay hasn’t given a life time of service to Mayo Gaa but the archives says he played in 63 games. He had 33 wins it says.
Paddyjoejohn if you look at the Mayo team that started the 1985 All Ireland 9 players played more times for Mayo than Kevin. 4 played over 100, TJ Kilgallon 132, D Flanagan 130 W. J. Padden 118, M. Carney 102. I was surprised Padraig Brogan played 81 times

@lucero

Those 5 players were in the best 20 to ever play for the county. Kevin wasn't in that league.
Ask Jimmy Sloyan what he thinks!
Learn your history!

Injury can put paid to any career. Anyone getting a serious leg injury, for instance, didn't have access to the facilities or care that abounds today. I don't understand why people don't get that these guys have jobs and families to consider, and that they don't get paid for being a parish or county hero.

Kevin McStay was a good player hit hard by injury. He had way more skill and modern football sense than most of the 1989 team that were badly hampered by players stuck in 1979 football.

I’d be interested in hearing what Colm Boyle and less so Billy Joe Padden have to say about the recent Minor and u20 management teams stepping down.
Does Boyler feel there is the makings of a good management teams stepping down within the county … These are the hard questions they should be asked , as I presume they get paid for it and one supporters would be interested in

Regional mini centres makes a lot more sense. We're a big county and gaelic football needs to be nourished throughout the county.
There is also a need for director of football so that structures are modelled on best practice.

The upgrading schools facilities that already have dressing rooms is absolutely obvious and would benefit from co funding.
It would lift our schools also.

Not sure why this thing about trying to quantify Kevin McStays lifetime commitment to Mayo is coming from. All of us on here would say we’ve similar commitment and have never played at the levels he’s done. I’d never question that of any of them. It may not have been meant to be disrespectful but it comes across a tad like that to me. We need to move on.

@My Ball: Colm wouldn't really be in a position to answer a question like that at the moment, given he's one of those stepping down from leading (to great results and fairly rave reviews from within and without the camp) the u19 Dev Squad.

A fair chance he's fielding plenty of phone calls with people asking if he'd join their tickets (local or national), and I'd imagine more than a zero % chance he's potentially hoping to put together a ticket of his own at the moment. If we were to do a blog poll I'd imagine he'd be the current favourite for the 20s gig, with potential involvement with a senior setup one of the most likely obstacles to that happening.

Love the idea for the series.

One comment that I hope is seen as constructive. Will there be engagement and a chance to speak for those who have been vociferous in asking what seem to be fair and reasonable questions of those in charge now and in the past. Regardless of the inappropritate approach of some in how they do this this has been used as a smokescreen to ignore the questions.

Without examining these issues there will be a big gap in what the series is seeking to.achieve.

Correct Pod Fan, there are valid questions, but the manner of the questioning (or attacking/slandering as it could also be framed) by he who shall not be named, has meant the questions are lost in all the noise.
It's far more beneficial in the longer run to have someone who isn't on a vendetta or looking for notoriety to ask these questions in a respectful, but probing manner.
Ed McGreal is the man who comes to mind, so I'm looking forward to this series and to see if it prompts club delegates to raise these issues directly with the CB executive.

Why has nobody mentioned Mickey Harte as a possible for the Mayo job. There has been a lot of talk about securing a winner, no better man on that count.

Would love to see a schools pod, maybe we could get the Senior managers or Principals of Geralds Colmans, Rice college, Ballinrobe or Muredachs as there the main feeder schools to the County panel and ask what they need to compete with the best schools in Connacht and Ireland especially Kerry and the Ulster schoolsin terms of coaching, pitches, access to gym equipment, games promotion officers.Geralds , Colmans and Rice college alone should have a GPO each it terms of the amount of County players they produce.

I see there are 5 people being talked about as the next possible Mayo manager, surely there are a few more, also a few guys not in management currently.

Firstly, very glad to see this blog/series take place and thank you to the lads doing it. It’s definitely required and I’d hope it genuinely serves to instigate the real change that’s required for Mayo to get to where we want to be, which is actually winning All
Ireland titles at all grades, including Hogan Cup level and I echo those calling for greater focus on schools. Of course, clubs are hugely important but Mayo GAA really needs even greater attention to schools football. There should be a fun ‘Club Mayo’ type skills programme introduced at primary level (a well coordinated and correctly monitored one) designed to enhance kids interest and passion for the Green & Red, to promote Mayo GAA in a positive and successful fashion (instilling a belief from a young age that Mayo can be the best) thus providing our second level colleges with highly skilled (left/right) positive and ambitious young footballers. That simple target in itself would give our second level teams and in turn, our academy/underage teams a distinct advantage in their quest to be successful. At 2nd level, we’ve had more success in recent years but absolutely can improve. I really Mayo schools being successful on a national level can be hugely beneficial for county teams. For too long, I think we’ve been too relaxed with our approach to winning. We need to start preparing our youth to maximise their chances of success. Like I said on a previous thread, and without wanting to sound overly harsh, but we need to move away from it being ok to lose. Whatever way we’ve been doing things for decades has only brought us so far. Do we produce the natural talent? Without question. Are we maximising that talent? Absolutely not. We keep losing. So, change is required and I hope this podcast series proves to be a driver in forcing or positively influencing the change that’s required. Sure, some feathers will be ruffled. I think all the guys on the pod have made it clear, any criticism is nothing personal but lads, please do your best. Don’t hold back and good luck with the series.

Two more things.

1. Divisional teams. Absolutely needs to be brought in. Complete no brainer.

2. Fundraising. Enormous scope to tap into the huge Mayo support in Ireland and overseas. Thousands would be willing to donate in some capacity be it a DD of €10 a month or €100 a month or more. Have some type of fundraising programme with specific projects and use the thousands globally to support that financially.

It should be about ruffling feathers, Mayonaze. They say a friend is someone who'll tell you an uncomfortable truth. There's a hell of a lot wrong with the culture within IMO. I'm not one for unjust criticism but I firmly believe it will take an outsider to reverse the damage done. Within all organisations it becomes very samey when a safe pair of hands or a boss-pleaser gets promoted to copper-fasten the groundwork laid down by those who can't accept their own limitations.

Impact of schools can be very overstated. The amount of extra curricular activities out of hours has greatly reduced across the board, while I agree it would be good to try work with schools the clubs are far more important as they are practicality 52 weeks a year operations.
When look at Hogan cup winners you’ve had more recent winners from Fermanagh, Offaly, Kildare, Down, Longford and even Carlow than Mayo or Dublin and they haven’t exactly set world alight at intercounty.

I was involved in underage club level for a few years and from what i could see there was a lot of management ego wanting to win more than bringing slow developers along. I saw many kids worshipped and everything built around them as the standout player and the same player couldn't understand years later why he was struggling to get into senior team when lads had caught up physically. Believe it or not losing is character building more so than constantly winning. There's a lot of talk about that topic at the moment and I remember Darren o Sullivan mentioning that on a podcast last year

I think we’ve filled our quota of losing over the years!! What harm is there is trying a new strategy of aiming to win everything and see where it takes us, but first there are serious structure changes required. I’d agree @Ever the Optimist that there’s too much pally stuff and not enough harsh truths.

A ‘Director of Football’ or overseeer of some kind is crucial in my opinion. I think it’s the most important appointment in Mayo, or should be. More than who takes the senior team.

To keep the ideas close to your themes

1. Culture - Are we as county too accepting of losing or not winning all Ireland’s? Why?! Does defeats of the past layer onto the next final?

Secondly on this theme, do we have a compulsive need to be liked and respected nationally as a county that somewhat feeds into our players psyche ? We get awfully upset when people don’t rate our footballers. Bar the 2012-2017 group, we generally lack an edge or nastiness. All the best teams have it. Who had that phrase around killing your granny to win, but it’s true for me

2. Coaching - firstly can we get a sense of what coaching happens underage? I often read on this forum about the likes of C McDonald or CBoyle and the rave reviews their coaching gets but practically what is being done? Are lads being coached to use both feet? What’s the forward coaching looking like? I have no idea

Is there anyway to get an alternative voice on what good looks like? What about a coach from one of these schools in Derry or Tyrone winning Hogan Cups coming into a pod. Wishful thinking I know but it would be great to hear a benchmark

Thanks everyone for their contributions so far. We're busy working away reaching out to various people involved at various levels and trying to explore as many aspects as required. All the information, arguments and questions here will also greatly help to inform our discussions. Thanks very much for taking the time to contribute. Watch this space!