The minors have made it to the Connacht final: they beat Leitrim by 2-12 to 1-7 in this afternoon’s semi-final, which concluded a few minutes ago at Markievicz Park. They now face Galway in the final in two weeks time, with the venue for the decider dependent on who wins the senior replay between Sligo and Galway that’ll get underway at Markievicz shortly.
Today’s win by the minors also means that, regardless of how the Connacht final goes, they’ve qualified for the All-Ireland quarter-finals. It’d still be good to win it, though, as this would be (a) a three-in-row at minor level in Connacht for us, (b) a win over Galway (which is always to be welcomed, however and whenever it happens) and (c) would result in a match against a defeated finalist from another province rather than a champion.
I haven’t got much more info on today’s match and I’m only connected to the wider world via so-called mobile broadband – aka BMH (i.e. Broadband My Hole) – using my iPhone as I’m still down in Clare. There should be some match reports up on the web later on tonight from those likely lads in the Mayo News and the Mayo Advertiser but Colm Gannon from the latter organ was tweeting earlier on to say that he and other members of the Fourth Estate had been denied access to the press box at Markievicz Park earlier on so the usual superb service from him as regards rapidly filed match reports may not apply in this instance.
Connacht final is in mchale park, hopefully we’ll have a strong mayo support for our minors.
Tv3 are covering the sligo/rosscommon match.
Pity Mayo didnt show your form WJ. Just like the men from the Kingdom you are showing your class as the battles hot up. I am afraid I did a Mayo on it and brought false league form into the championship and consequently I am awaiting a run in the qualifiers. Just read a review of club football in Mayo Advertiser. An interesting habit is developing. Crossmolona, Shrule and Castlebar are referred to respectivly as John Maughans, Ken Mortimers, and Peter Fordes . However opposition are just referred to as Aghamore, Claremorris and Moy Davitts minus the names of their managers. The same happens when Colm O Rourkes St Patricks Navan plays college football. The big guy is always name checked , can never recall Crossmolina being called Tommy Jordans Deel Rovers. Not a criticism though, merely a reflection on the influence a big name brings. And the fact that I have nothing constructive to do this morning. Well I have but the old body is oxed.
If you insist on comparing me to the Kerrymen, ontheroad, I’ll have no option but to get into Kerry mode, i.e. completely downplaying my chances, refusing to look beyond the next outing and lacing every statement with a generous dosing of “yerra” and a side order of “in all fairness”. You have been warned!
Interesting point re the Big Men’s teams. Will we, I wonder, be Micko’s Mayo before the year is out??!
my spies down the wesht heard the results of the “text poll” on Mad Wesht this morn re the enw manager and who he/they wil be……
apparently micko was 1st choice with Noel C second…
Christ WJ i really hope we dont end up with Micko or Paudi. In fairness to county board, barring one or two notable disasters, they have given us the management teams that we wanted and I trust they will do so this time around.
Didn’t we try a Kerryman as manager before, with no great result?? Of the two being mentioned I would favour Micko ahead of the head wreck that is POS. Perhaps a new Messiah will appear before us that no one has yet thought of – the betting should be interesting over the summer months!
I see Waldron the county chairman got a months suspension after the referee reported him for comments uttered at the end of the Longford match.
Have to say that for the first time ever my esteem for the county board has risen. Now if Waldron felt compelled to lose the rag with the referee or his assistants what I wonder will the GAA do about that? its easy to suspend him for a month but the underlying problem in regards disputes with match officals will not go away.
I mentioned Keith Barr last week who suggested that Dublin refuse to play under the ref from the Meath match.
Mayo county board should now tell headquarters that they will refuse to play if certain referees officiate at games involving mayo. Last Aug poor officaldom cost us v Meath yet we swallowed on that one. We have to stand firm against unfairness and if that pisses off certain sections of the media and the GAA….tough. Had we hung tough after 1948, 1985 or 1996 then we would not be seen as pussy cats now.
Surprised to see this has not been mentioned yet but then WJ – you cann’t be buying/reading them all.
Anyway here goes. It’s an excellent (and rather sobering) article on us I think and the last line is the most significant.
http://www.tribune.ie/sport/gaelic-football/article/2010/jul/04/mayos-past-is-key-to-future/
I think we could all have been cited for Category 1A offences directed at the ref at full-time in Pearse Park! The bollix. He should go off and join the nuns if normal matchday language isn’t to his liking. A ref’s blacklist would be good, for sure, but with the likes of McEnaney (never forgiven, never forgotten), McQuillan, O Bollixamha and that eejit Hughes already on the list, I’d say we’d rapidly work our way through the rest of them in short order. What we should definitely object to, every single time it happens, is having a ref from a county that borders ourselves or our opponents (unless it’s a Connacht championship game, even if that does mean having to put up with Marty Duffy). McEnaney, McQuillan and the Mother Superior all fall into that category. Coincidence or what?
Thanks for posting the link to that article, JPM – I hadn’t seen it before now. It’s an interesting and very well-informed assessment and I’d agree that the way he concludes the piece is the most significant bit of it.
Kieran Shannon is a good writer but in honesty he tells us nothing we already dont know. In using Monaghan as a comparison to how we might resurface tells me more about Eastern based writers than it does about Mayo football. Monaghan havent won an Ulster title in yonks. They are a boring horrible highly motivated team along the lines of Armagh 2002 but without the class Armagh had. Lets not make total fools of ourselves here grasping at media gurus who profess to have an interest in us. Funny that Longford gets credit for taking a sad Mayo out. Where was the credit when we were flying at a different level…basically we never got it. Mayo the football county will have hit a new low if we were to adapt the template of Monaghan as a way forward. We even managed to beat them in this years league not that we can reley on that as a barometer. When Monaghan win Ulster, appear in five senior All-Irelands inside a 17 year spell , then I might look to them for wisdom. According to Mayo 60 years of Football we have played them 12 times with a win ratio of 8, 1 draw and 3 defeats. No, when we come back it wont be from lessons McAneaney’s brother might teach us.
ontheroad Im very reluctant to blame refs in general. Whatever about the meath one the Longford one, well, we we only have ourselves to blame for that result. Even if Mickey Kearns was reffing it we should have beaten them. Having said that I thought the refs decision to blow up the game after Dillon was wrestled to the the ground in the last second was an absolute disgrace and HAD to be questioned. Its the worst decision I have seen given against us( not Liam Mchales sending off which by the rules was legit). Fair play to Waldron…maybe they are getting the message from the likes of sites like this. Kinneavy would not have done it in a high profile televised game. A 50 + yard free would have been awarded but then again its unlikely we would have got it.
You see Ted the way I see it is this. Mayo by the nature of the style they play tend to squander a lot of what they get. However this is what annoys me. Even if we are as wasteful as the present goverment we have a right to expect fairplay on the field. I hold no brief for mayo or the referees, however I will never cease pointing out when we have been dealt with wrongly. Cunniffe was chopped down v Tyrone qualifiers 2007. The ref blew for time up. Can you imagine him doing that v Tyrone had they being running through. The Meath match last year was a disgrace and apparently Dillon should have been awarded a free before the final whistle in Longford. Throw in the uneven decisions from the league final and its plain that the referees and their assesors regard Mayo as a soft target. Unless the county board tell the bigwigs that we will refuse to play under certain refs then we will get shafted. Contrast the way the ref handled Tomas O Se and Kerry v Limerick last week. Yeah I know , the cccccccc whatever will deal with him but in the meantime both Cork and Limerick were beaten. Both those counties are also regarded along the lines of Mayo.
Refs will give nothing to Mayo because that’s where we are in pecking order now. Also as pointed bad refereeing descisions are not only handed out to us.
Mayos first all ireland was secured by a charge down of a kick out with a goal for us as a result. Didn’t see the game obviously but I have never heard of a charge down of a kick out not being punished. Back in those times though we were a big name GAA football team.
I also don’t agree with K Barr on refs.
I think Refs will always be more amenable to Dublin becasue it’s in the interests of the GAA that Dublin do well as there is more money to be made while Dublin are in the championship.
By the way onetheroad w.r.t the K Shannon article I don’t read him advocating the Monaghan blueprint as the way forward for Mayo. He only cites them in an example. He’s in favor of what he says in the first sentence and the final one.
Mis-print there – that should have been mayos 2nd all ireland.
Willie Joe , I see you tweeted that your namesake would like to manage Mayo. Now I know I am based abroad but I never heard anything about him having a managerial career, does anyone know if he has any experience at all in the bainisteoir bib ?
Also fellow bloggers can we please run through the candidates again as you see them ?
Mchale ?
Connolly ?
Paudi??
Well it seems to be between Connelly, Forde, Holmes, McHale, Horan, Maughan, Dempsey, M Moran and O’Se (Lord save us – see how I left him to the end?!).
I’m not sure who else is in the running as PP don’t have any betting avaliable online.
Out of them, I think Holmes has pretty much ruled himself out and I’m hoping the county board have more sense than to consider O’Se.
I think Horan’s lack of inter-county experience might rule him out for now and I can’t see Maughan coming back for a third time.
As for McHale, there’s just something about him that tells me he wouldn’t cut it as the main man in a county set-up. I have no idea what it is to be fair. Maybe he just doesn’t seem ruthless enough, I don’t know.
Personally I’d like to see Connelly get it. I like the idea of continuity, as we’ve seen with Dempsey getting the U21 job. I’m thinking along the lines of Mickey Harte in Tyrone as well.
Connelly will know the players well (I’m assuming that’s a good thing and he hasn’t had any major falling outs with any of them in the past) and I only hear good things about his motivational skills and rousing team talks.
But to be honest, I know very little about many of the candidates, I can only go with how things appear to me on the outside. I’m sure there are behind the scene factors that will ultimately decide the issue. And probably some internal politics as well…
Have to say i like the continuity as well Dan , I know i tend to always go on about jack o connor ( but onyl becuase his book was so excellent rather than his achievements..) but look how he cut his teeth at parish, schools and then county U-21 level before he became county manager. If its good enough for Kerry….
Continuity is what we want however remember Mickey Harte had to serve his apprenticeship under Art McCrory for a few years. Connelly is a no brainer if he wants it but it would be nice to see him groomed at number 2 for a couple of years. The real problem is finding the number 1 for him. If i had to put the mortgage on it i reckon the county board will go for Forde/connelly combination. Would i be happy with that????? Jury is out for me on Forde.
I’m with you Ted on Forde.
He spent 7 years with Sligo and Galway, with just 1 Connacht title to show for it all.
But my main gripe is the style of football his teams played (particularly during his time with Galway), very defensive and unattractive to watch.
Good article in the Mayo News about the current state of football in the county (not that we’re in any doubt really).
http://www.mayonews.ie/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=10252:where-does-mayo-football-go-from-here&catid=14&Itemid=100008
Just a point. Someone rightly points out that Horan has a lack of onter county experience. Perhaps that might be a blessing. Kevin Walshe and yer man below in Wexford (Jason Ryan) didnt have much in that area but galvanised two lesser lights. Big Joe and Johnno have/had it in spades and look at the mess thay are in. By the way I never even heard of the manager from Louth but he seems to have done ok. He even gets to wear shorts and not have the media ride it to death a la John Maughan.
ah ontheroad , i’m sure he hasnt a fine pair of tanned legs like Maughan 🙂
Maughan has still fine tanned legs, I was about to make a case for him as next manager but just havent the energy anymore. Saw Maughan down at the Comortas in Belmullet and he looked fitter than some of this years Mayo team.
Third time lucky ontheroad? would be more than interested to hear your case for him should you find a bit of spare time and the energy.
Id take Maughan with Connelly right now if offered it.We know what we’ll get with both of them and its a quality that has been seriusly lacking over the last four years – motivation. Taking a punt on an unproven could set us back even further…actually it would keep us where we are( we can go any lower).
Maughan with Connelly is a good call.
I’ve never been convinced about managers going back (O’Mahony being the latest example…), but I think Connelly learing from Maughan could benefit us in the future.
Again, a lot of it depends on their relationship with each other. Noel being captain under Maughan previously would suggest there is a bond and mutal respect, but who knows now what the situation is .
RogerMilla I would echo Ted and Dan. It was no fluke that Maughan took us to three finals inside eight years. He also did the gig with the U21s. Maughan obviously has the mojo but possibly has a fatal enough flaw. He doesnt surround himself with two/three ruthless men who will work with him but pull his chain when he gets too ambitious. John M wants to see himself be the man who delivers the Holy Grail. Afraid the day of one man doing that is gone. Look at the characters backing Jack O Conner and Micky Harte. So if Maughan was to go forward I would be happy provided he took on board no yes men Perhaps a place for JP Kean, Tom Jordan, Pat Fallon, Noel Connelly nor would I balk to see Holmes with him. Pat was his enforcer on the pitch, not as many think, Connelly. I will never forget the job he did on Geraghty in his prime. Time we maybe put in a Maughan but backed with real steel.
Don’t agree with the re-appointment of J maughan. He had two stints which were both successful but I believe he is too arrogant for the position. I think you have nailed his fundamental flaw Ontheroad but i dont think putting anyone in with him will make any difference as he always did it his way and I wouldn’t see that changing for album number 3.
ontheroad Good post- a rare good article by Kieran Shannon. I’m sick of reading the Tribune… they’re great at telling you what happened last Sunday, and why it should have been obvious to anyone with a pair of eyes… and also talk as if they are the only ones whos opinions matter… Shannon is himself a sport psychologist who earns his living from some of these teams so I’d question how he can write objectively on those teams or opponents. Some of these lads in the papers speak as if they won multiple All Irelands themselves instead of being pencil-men. Colm O’Rourke in the Irish Racing Post on a Friday and the Sindo is the top man. Experience with cop-on.
sorry innocentbystander but i cannot stand orourke and his pontifications…
galway out of the championship , dark times in the west.. again…
Strange days for sure – both ourselves and Galway gone from the championship while Sligo, Leitrim (for the next few hours at least) and Roscommon are all still in the hunt. I don’t think we’ve ever seen that before!
Roger it reminds me of the distant past, the one we thought Maughan and Johnno had rid us of, where other provinces would look on getting a Connacht team in the semi as a ‘gimme’. O’Rourke is the best of a bad lot… GAA analysts in general are a hundred miles behind the soccer lads- it’s not just on the pitch that professionalism shows.
Re the Mayo Manager job, if Peter Forde thought PJoyce was over the hill when he was Galway manager it doesn’t say much for his judgement, given the man’s displays this year. The championship is a poorer competition for his absence.
innocnetbystander
I completely agree with your evaluation of Peter Forde. Dumping the likes of Padraig Joyce showed very poor judgement indeed – a bit like dumping Kieran Mac!
What we need in a manager is a guy with passion for Mayo and good old fashioned football commom sense.
Dara O Cinneide is an excellent analyst and Anthony Tohill isn’t half bad either. He made a very insightful point on Galway today I thought. He commented that they seemed to him to be a team that just wanted to do enough to get over the line every time. A team that once they had the lead had no desire to really push for home and that’s whats ultimately let them down.
JPM. At the match on Sat and ultimately our own fault as we should have drove on like we should have in the Sligo replay. Every county seems to one time or another have an issue with refs. It was our turn on Sat with a very dodgy penalty given to Wexford. When can a defender tackle i will never know. We had Jimmy White before and i was not impressed. Umpires like in Croker yesterday were asleep and seem to have no role.