Photo: MichaelMaye.com
He was, by common consent, our strongest performer a few weeks back against Dublin and, by a wide margin, Diarmuid O’Connor has come out on top in the Man of the Match poll on yesterday’s game. Diarmuid got 46% of the votes in this poll, with Shane Nally next on 16%, Brendan Harrison 7% and Ger Cafferkey on 6%.
As I said in yesterday’s match report, it’s striking how rapidly Diarmuid – just like Cillian did before him – has progressed from newbie to one of the real leaders in the team. His phenomenal workrate is almost a given at this stage but yesterday he showed that, like the big brother, he can handle the pressure too.
More power to you, Diarmuid, and congrats on another fine performance yesterday.
A class act
Mother of Christ, this is the first I’ve seen of this penalty incident and I’m in shock. This video should be sent to GAA headquarters, demanding an explanation as to what standards they expect from referees. If there was ever an example of ineptitude by a referee and his umpires, well you sure have it here. These three un-fortunate guys were clearly intimated by the players and were never going to take any worthwhile actions.
How Diarmuid was able to compose himself and score that penalty speaks volumes about the character of this very young and very talented guy.
DOC sets a great example in all that he does.
I agree with you there Mayo McHale but it appears,strangely,that attitudes vary in relation to that kind of silly cynical behaviour. I presume
there has been debate on this site in the past concerning indiscipline and that may explain the dearth of condemnation forthcoming from bloggers.
Mayo McHale. You are right about that video getting sent to HQ but we all know it wont be and nothing will be done about it and Donegal will get away with it. I reckon it took a full 4 minutes just to get the penalty taken and how much injury time was only added on at the end?
From now on we need to learn to play the ref on the day. If the ref is weak and letting blatant acts of thuggery go we need to play 1 or 2 dirty 6 foot 4 thugs of our own who will go out there with no intention of playing football. We really needed a hard man out there on Sunday who would put McGee on his arse or get him carried off on a stretcher. We have been too nice for far too long. We have put up with dirt and filth for far too long only to see a weak ref dishing out a yellow. Also if the opposition is allowed to have a fella in a tracksuit from their back room, spend nearly all the 70 minutes on the pitch we need to follow suit and get some of our own back room fellas on there too whenever they feel like it.
Look, if that incident had taken place in reverse down in front of our goal I doubt there would be too many complaining about thuggery, instead we’d be lauding the cynicism and the delaying tactics. We can’t have it both ways and the way I see it, either we step up and mix it with the big boys or we shut up. I agree we need to start playing on the line and reading the ref. But we also need to play smart – there was little point in any Mayo player retaliating at that point – the ref was clearly out of his depth and if we had been spotted throwing punches or putting McGee on a stretcher (seriously?), a straight red would have been an easy decision. Then bang, we’re looking at indiscipline, we’re down another player for a must-win game next Sunday and the recriminations and begin again.
Jim Flag, it took about four and half minutes from start to finish – a pretty damning indictment of the refereeing that was on offer on Sunday for sure.
Agree that Diarmuid is exemplary in his conduct and clearly has nerves of steel.
Agree with Anne-Marie. Liam McHale sent off in ’96. Seamus O’Shea black carded last year at a crucial juncture. Richie Feeney black carded in a club final. Keegan red-carded in a semi-final. Kevin Keane sent off in a quarter-final. Were these incidents applauded by the keyboard warriors at the time?
Let’s not lose ourselves in rightful indignation here. Mayo are by no means a team of altar-boys. We can dish out the cynicism when we want to, albeit not with at the same extremes as other teams, but has that really been our undoing over the past few years?
I don’t want to see us become a dirty team, we don’t need to go down that route. Smarten up of course, as one poster said here, draw the fouls when in the scoring zone, wind the clock down, protect our own, delay the play. Play it smart and leave the thuggery to the thugs
Ultair, most of them incidents you mention were with different refs who were taking no shit. Once it becomes clear that you have a ref who is out of his depth and has no control of the game and the opposition are taking advantage of that (eg last Sunday), then you need to take advantage too. Away games in Ulster with a weak ref is a “perfect storm” for exemplary behaved players like Diarmuid.
Monaghan away next up. How about getting our “water carrying man” to run on to the pitch every time their free taker is lining up a free and just run across in front of him in his line of vision. That happens to us a lot. The Dubs had it down to a T in 2012 but still didn’t put Cillian off. What goes around comes around. Only saying like.
That’s fair enough Jim, people were justifiably angry here about the treatment we got on the pitch, and emotions seemed to have boiled over here in the meantime, but if ‘taking advantage’ means laying lads out on stretchers and inflicting injuries then I don’t think it’s going to do us much good. It only takes one red card for a weak ref to assert himself. Say what you want about us but we’re well able to marshal the troops on our day, it’s early on in the league yet with plenty of inexperienced players on the team. Our most pressing issues at the moment are in defence and upfront. Solve that and it will come good.