It’s Monday morning, I know, but – hey – the sun is shining and it’s not pissing rain (not, as yet, in these parts anyway) and we’ve now less than a week to wait before the lads finally play a championship match this year. It sure has been a long time coming (equally so in the case of the sunshine and the football but not, sadly, where it’s come to the rain) and I’d say most people outside the county have forgotten we’re even in the bloody thing this year. This coming Sunday is, then, the day to set all and sundry to rights on that score.

Over the weekend just gone, it was – in my humble opinion at any rate – Donegal who fairly emphatically announced their intentions for the summer. Sure, Derry were worse than pathetic but Donegal beat the living shite out of them and in doing so and in posting their second big score of the campaign, they provided further proof that they’ve managed to add considerable attacking menace to their game-plan, while retaining the same kind of uncompromising approach to defending that they unveiled last year. Are they – Jimmy McGuinness’s Daniel O’Donnell-like verbal cadences aside – the new Tyrone? Their meeting with the old Tyrone in two weeks time seems perfectly timed to test this proposition.

The draw for the first round of the qualifiers was made this morning, full details – if you haven’t already got them – are here. If you’re wondering where Kerry and Galway are, the answer is that they’re still in the hat as this round is confined to those counties beaten in their respective provinces prior to the semi-final stage: the draw for Round 2 will see the eight survivors from Round 1 drawn against the eight beaten semi-finalists. If we don’t watch our Ps and Qs next Sunday we could find ourselves in there too at that stage.

No word on a teamsheet for Sunday yet, of course, but if you want to take part in the competition on naming the team you really need to get the proverbial finger out at this stage. Entries to mayogaablog@ymail.com by midnight at the latest if you want to be in with a chance to win my final spare copy of Breandán Ó hEithir’s Over the Bar.

Finally, Paul has been on to ask for a plug about a new blog he’s involved in called Grannykiller.com, which (so it says) is a collective of journalists who enjoy the football of Stephen Ireland and the music of Creedence Clearwater Revival. In this post, Paul talks about his support for Man City but, as a Foxford man, he can’t avoid bringing the Mayo footballers into the discussion as well.