Mayo’s U20 footballers this evening completed four straight wins in the group stage of this year’s Connacht Championship. In a high-scoring encounter at Markievicz Park tonight, Peadar Gardiner’s charges led from first to last and beat Sligo in the end by 5-22 to 2-16.

The tone was set right from the start, with early points from Darragh Beirne and Niall Hurley inside the first two minutes. Then after the home team had opened their account, Oisín Cronin hit back for us and six minutes later Niall Hurley rattled the Sligo net for the first time.

Tom Lydon then got in on the scoring act. His first one – a two-pointer from play – was a real peach and he followed it up with a free, only one of two scores we got from placed balls this evening.

They got their second score of the evening from a free but we broke rapidly from the restart and Paul Gilmore finished the move with a nice score. Then after they got their first from play we broke fast again, this time Cathal Keaveney finishing to the net.

We were rampant now. Niall Hurley added a point and then Darragh Beirne intercepted an attempted pass out and drove the ball to the net. A point from Oliver Armstrong, sandwiched between two scores for Sligo, saw the first half end with our lads thirteen points to the good.

We came out swinging after the break too. Darragh Beirne pointed a free and then, after Sligo’s restart was turned over, the same player found the net for the second time. When Oisín Cronin fisted over soon after we were now eighteen points clear.

To their credit, Sligo battled back bravely. So much so that, within six minutes, they’d shaved that deficit in half, thanks to three two-pointers and a goal. It looked then as if a proper match might yet break out.

They kept plugging away too for much of the second period and, at one stage, had pared the gap back to just seven points.

But we came with another strong push down the closing stretch. We outscored them by 1-7 to 0-2 in the closing ten minutes – Niall Hurley equalling his Claremorris clubmate by bagging a second goal – and our lads ran out comfortable fifteen-point winners at the end.

With four straight wins, Mayo now advance directly to the Connacht final. Roscommon, who had a big win over Leitrim in tonight’s other Round 5 match (which in the process eliminated Galway), will now meet Sligo in next week’s semi-final to decide which of them we’ll meet in the final in a fortnight’s time.

Mayo: Conor Meaney; Rio Mortimer, Paul Gilmore (0-1), Eoin McGreal; Hugh O’Loughlin, John MacMonagle, Colm McHale; Oliver Armstrong (0-1), Séamus Howard; Oisín Cronin (0-3), Cathal Keaveney (1-0), Colm Lynch (0-1); Darragh Beirne (2-6, one free), Niall Hurley (2-4), Tom Lydon (0-4, one 2pt, one free). Subs: Dara Neary (0-1) for Keaveney, Luke Feeney (0-1) for Armstrong, Matthew Gordetskyy for McGreal, Jack Keane for Howard, Daithí Butler for Gilmore.

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