Sligo have named their starting fifteen to face us on Sunday. It’s an unchanged line-up from the one that started against London. Here it is:
Sligo (Connacht SFC v Mayo): P Greene; C Harrison, P Naughton, R Donovan; P McGovern, M McNamara, E McHugh; E O’Hara, K Quinn; B Curran, B Egan, J Davey; G Gaughan, M Breheny, D Kelly.
The big talking point is that captain Noel McGuire still isn’t ready to return at full-back, where Padraig Naughton continues to deputise. I’d still say we might see the Easkey man on the pitch at some stage on Sunday. Tommy Jordan has also made a few positional switches, notably by moving Johnny Davey from the half-backs to the half-forward line, but the team named represents continuity rather than change. I suppose we might see the Mayo team later tonight (I’ll be checking the Mayo GAA website around the witching hour, just to be sure) and it would be great if we do as it’ll put us out of our agony about all those up-for-grabs places in the backs and the injuries up top.
Poor old Paul Galvin. I know he’s a bit of a scut but I can’t see how he deserved 24 weeks for what he did on Sunday. Sure, it was dumb beyond belief and he should have been able to keep a lid on his temper, not least because a second yellow sending-off wouldn’t have ruled him out of the Cork game and would have made no difference to the outcome of Sunday’s lopsided clash with the Bannermen. Messing with the ref means that he had to get punished but surely something like 12 weeks would have been enough in the circumstances? Now he’s been made a martyr of and so Kerry have, as has already been pointed out by a poster on this site, the perfect motivation to drive on for the three-in-a-row.
Just read Kevin McStay’s column there on mayo’s chances and unless I misread, he attributes Mayo’s position as favourites purely to historical factors.
I watched Leitrim Sligo in the league in Carrick (really had nothing better to be doing) and they were shocking. They looked amateurish. My own feeling is this group of players have reached their goal and will be content to accept pints in pubs for it for the rest of their lives. And in a small county with the system ridiculously stacked against them I won’t blame them and would probably be delighted to do the same myself.
Mayo have by far the better team and should win by mnimum 5 points. I understand Mayo are not settled, but losing to Sligo would deliver a near-fatal blow to Johnno’s plans for the team. And if his plans are going to be destroyed, he will not allow Sligo, of all counties to do it.
mayo team just announced http://www.clubmayo.ie/116.php
Hi Furboot – thanks for that. I was trying, without success, to get onto MidWest at the time. Fair play to the Club Mayo Dublin site too: they were on the ball rapidly with the news.