Sean Feeney’s annual report to next Monday’s Mayo GAA Convention is covered in this week’s Mayo News and although Mike Finnerty describes the County Secretary’s report as “low-key”, it does contain a few nuggets that are worth poking round for a bit.

The first is that Feeney confirms (in a separate report in the paper here) that naming rights at the redeveloped McHale Park will be up for grabs.  All options are apparently being looked at in this regard, which means that it could just be the shiny new stand that gets named but I guess it’s more likely that the ground itself will have to don some or other corporate mantle.  I’ve mixed feelings about such a move, given that renamed sports grounds (whatever the code, wherever they are) sound, well, a bit shite really but it has to be conceded that this is an easy way to bring in some dosh.  As a result, I think we need to reconcile ourselves to having our own version of Kingspan Breffni Park as our home ground from next year.

The County Sec reckons the matches against Galway and Tyrone “could and should” have been won but that’s in the realm – literally, – of couda shouda wouda analysis.  We all should have switched our pensions into cash funds before the markets went tits up, I should have remembered to tape that World War II thing on BBC 2 last night, you should have … you get the message.  It’s in the past, they won, we lost and there’s nothing we can do about it now.  Feeney also says that we need to play as a team rather than as a bunch of individuals if we’re ever to win Sam again.  I’d say that this is (a) stating the bleedin’ obvious and (b) it’s not just Sam we won’t win if we don’t play as a team.

He’s on firmer ground, though, when he takes a swipe at the players who gave interviews over the summer where some daft things were said about our supposed lack of appetite for taking the tradesman’s entrance to the All-Ireland series.  He said that some of these interviews made him “cringe” and that the players would be better off doing their talking on the field.  I think he has a point there.  This year we’ve heard from different players that they either couldn’t give a hoot about winning another Connacht medal (with ennui on this front having apparently set in after winning only one or two provincial medals) or that they didn’t really like the look of the qualifiers.  To my simple mind, it’s fairly straightforward – we need to be aiming to win every Championship game, every year.  That’s how the Kerrymen approach things and we all know where that attitude gets them most of the time.