It’s probably not of all that much interest at this stage but there are obviously plenty of match reports out there on Saturday’s defeat to Down. Perhaps the most relevant ones at this stage are those contained in the dailies, all of which have a few quotes from James. Here they are: Irish Times, Irish Independent, Irish Examiner. There are loads of other reports online too, all of which I’ve filed away in the 2013 Results page (which acts as a kind of ante-room for the Results Archive section of the site).
The reports in the Indo and the Examiner contain identical quotes from James who says “there was a little shove in the back” which led to the decisive free being moved up to within scoring range. James also says that this wasn’t the only such free we conceded late on in the game before adding the now inevitable rider that “we’ll learn from it”.
I still think it was an incredibly harsh decision by the ref – the ball wasn’t in play when the incident happened, it wasn’t at all clear that there even was a shove and even if there was Coulter had a clear incentive to make a meal of it. And you can be damn sure that every one of our inside forwards would have been jostled and held as every free in we got was about to be taken but this was the only one punished.
It is, I know, water under the bridge that this stage but I think it’s a decision that may have major implications for us this year, given there’s every chance now that our head-to-head record against Down will be what’ll relegate us. Just the kind of cheery thought that’s needed on a cold and miserable Monday.
I have to feel sorry for Kevin Keane as every little error he makes is being punished 5 fold. The ball off the upright that slipped through his fingers in September v Donegal was clinically punished, his loose marking (and generally nervy performance) v Tyrone led to a number of scores coming off him and now this.
Harsh punishment for a little indiscretion. If the ref. had dealt with the Down player that broke Caffs nose half as well as he did for the little push by Keane, we would be talking about a victory this morning. I thought the ref was shocking, particularly in the first half when he was willing to let anything and everything go. It’s ironic that 2 of the major turning points of the match came as a result of the referees decisions when he was so determined not to make any at all in the first half.
Keep the chin up Kevin, I thought you were a shoe-in for an All-Star up until the final so work at it hard enough and your form will return.
Saturday is all that matters now.
Keane is a solid player, the slip last September was a slip and no more. He will return to form as will the others, and with the lads out injured at present to return mayo will rise again.
If they play their best mayo will be in the shakeup later this summer.
Even with them at their peak power I think mayo need to change the attacking options.
I live many miles away but follow them closely and wonder if there is a 6,5 or 6,6 muscle player in mayo? Not even a great player, McFadden and Murphy in donegal are fairly ordainary apart from the physical size of them.
In my opinion mayo really need to dig someone out of the club scene and get him training today to give them an option
We are seen as soft touches by all, did anyone hit the down player later in the game after caff had his nose broken?
From the outside looking in, mayo are far too soft.
I’m wondering who won the GAA colleges senior A final on Sat last – looked for it on MWR local radio website but they will probably carry it in a weeks time – shur whats the rush.
St Gerald’s won it, Mayo Exile – match report in today’s Irish Independent is here.
How can you say that mcfadden and Murphy are ordinary, all they have going for them is their size. Totally disagree, both of them are among the most skilful players around.
Mayo’s minors played Kerry in a challenge game at the weekend any result?
Incredible amount of comments for a league game in march.
Was at the game and there is no doubt laverty should have got the line, spoke with down people on sat night and according to them laverty is the dirtiest player in the county.
No attempt to play the ball-where was the linesman?looking up in the sky?
There are still 6 league points up for grabs, i have no doubt we will get what we need.
A lot of ball to be played yet.
Keane is being harsly treated no question about that. Fine player. Ref was brutal to put it mildly. Main problem I believe is slow decision making from the line. Some people complaining that players are carrying the ball too much so what do they want them to do ? Kick it into the hands of the opponets sweeper? Down simply coppied Tyrones game plan and again we didn’t respond. JH needs to axt quicker lets hope “he learns from it”.
I watched that free again on tv. The original “free” was exactly on the 45 meter line the moved forward one was taken from the 20 meter line. A 25 meter change
Spotted that myself Ceideboy and was wondering how the hell the ref. came up with that one. I thought the ref lost control of the match early when he failed to blow up for numurous “over-tackling” incidents in the first half. This led to both sides taking liberties with the rules and Coldrick didn’t do anything about it. The end result was Laverty taking a cowardly cheap shot at Cafferkey who up to that point was having a good duel with Coulter.
Where is Brolly now with his accusations of our cynical play? His northern neighbours are the masters at it. Although I have to admit I was hoping that Boyle or Vaughan would lay him out in retaliation, there is no doubt that Coldrick would have seen that one.
David don’t agree bout McFadden and Murphy, big men surely, but serious footballers, Murphy in particular has it all.
Have to agree with HSS51 plenty of football to be played yet, I think alot of commentators are getting too too carried away & need to refocus. Remember Last year year’s league – shockin against Donegal, threw away a win over cork, poor against Down, probably would have got a hammering against Dublin only for the fog. Look how the league came together in the end.
I know we’re not the same as last year but too early for me to talk of relegation just yet.
Bring on the Lillies
We have to ask our selves, why we’re in this position, two points from four matches,and battling to stay in division one. Yes we’ve had more than our share of bad refereeing decisions along the way, but all to often through bad decision making, by what should be by now, a very experienced team, squander good goal scoring opportunity’s, kick to many wide’s, give away to many soft frees and worst of all, seem not capable of winning a tight matches.
We can blame J H all we like, and question his tactics, but all our players, the very best in the County, having come through a very competitive club system, should by now, be well drilled in the skills of the game. Yet we see time and time again, those very players, having shone for their Clubs in County Championship matches and “flying in training” fail to perform on the big stage. Could it be as I said before, that maybe, just maybe, we’re not as good as we’d like to think we are ???
If Mayo played in any other province how many All Ireland Finals would we have got to recently? Connacht gets us to a higher stage – but we are not as good as we think
Firstly Cynical Cynthia, it is irrelevant which province you are from when it comes to reaching All-Ireland finals because the “back door system” makes that argument invalid. Secondly, if the basis of your argument was correct, i.e. stronger provinces producing better sides, then the back door system actually gives an advantage to supposedly stronger sides like Kerry, Dublin, Tyrone etc. as they all have a second chance to get through to a final. That follows that it is actually more difficult to get to an All-Ireland and win it now than it was in the past. Therefore, your comment is wrong.
My own opinion of “where we are” is that we are, and have been, consistently one of the top 4 or 5 sides in the country over the last 3 years. I do not believe that we are a top 2 side because of our real lack of a goal threat, but, we are more than capable of beating any side on our day. Just ask Cork of 2 years ago or Dublin and Down last year how good we can be and they will tell you.
For us to win an All-Ireland I believe we need a few things in our favour that maybe the likes of Kerry, Dublin and Donegal do not. We need a fully fit squad, we need the dodgy referee decisions to go our way that generally seem to go against us, (e.g. in the All Ireland a Cillian O’Connor foul and what should have been a free in but resulted in a free out and a goal for Donegal, Varley getting punched into the face by McGee that should have been a red but was never called and there are countless more), we need the ball to clip the inside of the post and go over instead of the outside and go wide and we need a goal sniffer.
I do take the point that it appears to us in the stands that the decision making process on the touchline is a little slow but we have to trust that they see the things we do a little clearer than maybe we give them credit for. In fairness, Nallen has over 100 championship games under his belt and a couple of All-Ireland final appearances, Horan was fairly handy on the big day himself and has great success at club level and Buckley is vastly experienced and highly regarded.
In summary, we did not become a bad side overnight and it is only March yet. I am going to keep the faith, and it is not blind faith, because after all this time there is no point giving up now.
Looks like we are in a relegation battle with Down. 3 matches left. Kildare, Donegal and Cork. I think we need at least 4 points from these three matches. Down have Kerry, Dublin and Kildare. it is still in our own hands whether we stay in division one or not. hopefully we pick up 2 points against kildare, and kick on from there. we could still make the semis if results go our way.
We really dont want to make the semi finals. When this month is over , only one thing matters galway on may 19. Nothing else matters.
Far be it from me to criticise management and coaching but for the life of me I cannot understand how we “spill” so much ball. Under 14 coaches will tell the youngster to grab the ball into your chest for a split second. We give the ball away so easily and it appears to be a trait in Mayo football for years.I don’t think this new coach we got after Christmas will read this?
We will beat Kildare.
Did anybody notice all the balls we gave away to Tyrone? one half back in particular. Every time Tyrone came back down the field and scored. This is not negative thinking. I am just being realistic.
I still say that we are team building and there is no panic. Look at Donegal!!!! Two seasons ago they kept the Dubs from scoring but couldn’t score themselves. They learnt from that, corrected their mistakes, changed their style somewhat and look where they are now. Mayo have the core of a terrific team but they are making too many consistent, uncorrected mistakes.
Jim McGuinness takes one game at a time only and learns from it; no looking forward to Sam. Why can Mayo not learn from that?
The amazing thing about Mayo is that taking the two terrible, leaked goals which put them under terrible pressure, using up all of their energy trying to catch up; and a few
awful wides, they had the beating of Donegal!!! It is easy to say that on their day they can beat anyone, but they need to be consistent. Then they can beat anyone!
Joe Mc makes good points but I suggest that we not copy anyone because the simple reason being , we are unable to do so. We tried the big Donaghy target man thing and it did not work. Our attempt at a corner forward as an extra defender was laughable in London in 2011 where the London number 2 scored as many points and almost knocked us out.
Trying to wear another mans suit never works. For effs sake we are Mayo and we should tailor our own style and then perfect it and eliminate any errors out of it.Who wants to be like Donegal except Donegal and counties that want to copy them. We have no McFadden and Murphy nor a Lacy but we have got enough good boys of our own to liberate and empower.
We currently actually have no style and the comparisons with Donegal should be confined to this. Both managers took over two underachieving teams at the exact same time. One has achieved the goal, one has not. 2010 Saw Donegal eliminated by Down and backdoored by Armagh. 2009 saw them walloped by Cork with double scores, they conceded 1-27 thats thirty points.
They got a manager who fashioned a style that would bring results. Bullshitters were asked to stay at home. Year two progressed to Big Lugs and naturally enough we said after you Cecil. So until we go to our own DNA, drill it to death and then unleash it on the pitch we will always be a poor mans Donegal or whoever is the current flavour of the month.
John. I don’t suggest we copy anyone. We are original. We can learn things from them though and still be ourselves.
Did you happen to see the All Ireland final Ballymun team in action against Croke’s of Kerry. They did kick a lot of wides but their defence and attack from defence was breathtaking. I never saw anything like it.
Mayo News analysis this week is really ‘on the money’
– Way too many turnovers. Lots of possession, but too often wasted. That has been obvious in all 4 games to date, even against Kerry. Dublin was definetely our best performance.
– A hugh number of these turnovers come in the FF Line. Not blaming the FF Line players alone, it’s also inaccurate and slow delivery, so that even when the ball is recieved they are surrounded.
Overall I think James is selecting the rights players. With maybe 1 or 2 minor exceptions I dont think we have better (fit) players on the bench or ourside the panel. What’s really worrying is that there doesn’t seem to be any progression in performance or tactics, same mistakes and same tactics. When we do try to play fast, direct ball in to the FFs it’s just not working. When we try to work the ball in via long hand-passing moves, invariably we crowded out by stacked defences.
Point taken Joe Mc, frozen here today, maybe I have brain freeze!
Some slightly over the top comments here. I really don’t see where all the doom and gloom is coming from.
I’m convinced we’ll stay up, starting with beating Kildare on Saturday. Being my first trip home this year, I can’t wait for it.
But for anyone who does feel like the end of the world is nigh, have a read of An Spailpin’s as always excellent piece on our current state.
http://spailpin.blogspot.co.uk/
Let know one be in any doubt that the game against Kildare will be a fight. After last weekends hammering by Dublin McGeeny (a man who i have great respect for ) will have them out for blood this weekend.
We need to be able for the physical side of things.
We need to dominate mid field .
We need to win the dirty ball.
We need to make very hard for kildare to work the ball up the field so our forwards are going to have put in a huge work rate off the ball as much as on the ball.
We need to play good direct football and when we do get the ball up to the forward line
We make the right passes at the right time and take the right shot options.
We need to take our goal chances when they come up . We need to keep our discipline.
And if we do all of the above we might, we just might get a win. Fingers crossed
Dan. Nice pick me up piece from Spailpin.
Dan. realistic, positive comment is not doom and gloom. It is the way to lift doom and gloom. We all want Mayo to do well. Where are the over the top comments? Wishful thinking has never won an All Ireland. We will stay up if we win matches, otherwise we won’t. Mayomaningalway has got it right, as he said ‘fingers crossed”.
Poor Ger Cafferty seems to have got an awful bang. Photo on mayogaa twitter.
It sure is a lot harder playing than commenting by email.
Thanks Dan for that, there was white smoke tonight so maybe our penance is to be rewarded and the Lenten Fast of League points will be over……..Spalpin isn’t far off the4mark
Not blowing my own trumpet but I think I have been preaching what the spailpin article has much more eloquently stated. Scrape by in division 1 and have a number of options going up to Salthill.
Looking forward to Saturday night. Kildare have a ropey enough defence and are prone to conceeding big scores. Like ourselves, they go through patches in games where they disappear from the scoreboard.
Here is hoping for a solid consistent performance, keep the scoerboard ticking over and a goal or two (for us!) would be nice.
Looking forward to the game on Sunday. I have been at all the games apart from the Down game and from what I have seen I think in patches we have played some excellent football that not even the mightty Dubs have been able to handle.Unfortunately we haven’t been able to sustain this play to see out these games but I’ve a feeling there is some serious training going on in the backround which has led to us playing in short bursts then fading out for long periods in games. There has been a gradual improvement of the delivery of the ball into our inside line and especially in the Down game we have mixed and matched this with our running game in a much smarter way thus making it harder for the oppostition to predict our attacking play.
I think Horan has done well in blooding as many players as he can like Cathal Freeman , Shane MacHale , Cathal Carolan etc… I would like him to give Jason Gibbons , Michael Walsh and Evan Reegan some more game time before the summer if possible. Against Kildare I think we should try a line-up something like this :
Clarke / O Malley
MacHale Keane Walsh/Higgins
Higgins/Barrett Keegan Boyle/ Feeny
A O’ Shea Gibbons
McLoughlin S O’ Shea Carolan
Doherty Barry Moran Conroy/Regan
It may be dangerous to experiment this much but I think at home against a Kildare side already safe and missing their U21’s it mught be our last chance to have a look at new players or new positions.
Well said spailpin. Grt article. Think we are doing alright and we are there or there abouts in every game so far. Its all about Galway in May. 11 weeks and counting. Add Cillian, Dillon and andy to this team and we will be ok.
on the way mayo are playing right know they will not beat kildare,donegal or cork,cant see where they are going to pick up points,hope I am wrong
Keep the faith guys and we’ll see how the Kildare match goes. Remember “The darkest hour is just before the dawn”…..