TG4 had already selected Donegal’s Michael Langan as their Man of the Match before the final whistle sounded at Markievicz Park yesterday. While the St Michael’s clubman put in a major shift for the O’Donnell County – banging over four superb points from play – we had our own candidate for that honour coming up the rails in those final frantic seconds of the contest.
Rob Hennelly had already kept us in the game with three crucial saves, one from a second half penalty, but his final act was even more dramatic. The free kick facing him deep into stoppage time was a tough one, well out on the left wing and at least forty yards from the posts with a howling wind swirling round the ground. Rob struck the kick off the ground, the contact was perfect and the trajectory was too. Here, look at it for yourselves:
Unbelievable score from Rob Hennelly to level the sides in the last kick of the game for @MayoGAA v @officialdonegal in The Allianz Football League! #GAANOW pic.twitter.com/vcILcsxtS5
— The GAA (@officialgaa) January 30, 2022
Without Robbie’s input for us at both ends of the field, we’d obviously have come away from yesterday’s opening round National League match empty-handed. It comes as no surprise, then, that he’s been voted by you as our Man of the Match from yesterday’s game. The Breaffy clubman was also included in this week’s GAA Team of the Week and, along with Armagh’s Rian O’Neill and Roscommon’s Enda Smith, he’s been shortlisted for the GAA’s Player of the Week award.
Others to feature prominently in the MOTM poll on yesterday’s game were Jason Doherty, who capped a hugely uplifting comeback from serious injury with three points from play at Markievicz Park, Paddy Durcan, who was also included in the GAA’s Team of the Week, Tommy Conroy, Ryan O’Donoghue and Aidan O’Shea.
Congrats to Robbie and all of the rest of the lads who stood tall for us yesterday.
Well done Robbie but that 37percent should be at least 73..keeping out 3 certain goal chances and scoring a beauty of a free dean rock would be proud of to equalise deserves to be lauded. God knows he’s seen the other side of the coin too. At the minute there’s no standout team (armagh need to put a couple more performances together to be considered standout} so the next couple of weeks should be interesting. A win next Sunday would put a pep in our step going into the break and ease the usual pressure we’d be under after 2 games. Definitely at this stage most of division 1 and probably galway would be considered serious candidates to win Sam.
There was one particular kick by Robbie yesterday that deserves a mention, into the 55th minute just after I think Donegal had scored their last point.
Kicked straight out to Jordan, Jordan takes the mark and kicks an excellent pass to Ryan, Ryan slots over from about 40 yards.
If only we could replicate that move more often!.
Well done Rob yesterday. Pity he didnt do this in AI finals. Looking at yesterdays named team we didnt have a spine .
No fullback, no centre half back, no midfield, and no centre forward. All replaced and one sent off. If thats the way JH is going to field teams for the rest of the league by replacing the spine after every match where do we go against Galway in Championship? Look at Michael Murphy yesterday at 32 years of age he was outstanding and look at our AOS 4 years his junior and were still thinking he will lead us to the promised land. It will be intresting to see who will win the last league match between Mayo and Kildare because i think this wiil be the team who looses will drop down to Div 2. If Galway beats us in the championship the its back to the drawing board. I think we will stay up in Div 1, but the championship i,m worried about.
You’re a bit out on Aidan’s age there, True Grit – if only it were the case that he was 28. He’s actually 31.
True Grit … I actually think the opposite, think we will get relegated in the League and do OK come championship… ( last 4 )
Well deserved and a fantastic free kick at the finish. I initially thought as the ball left the ground it was going to go well wide but no, it was perfect.
Aidans impact was immediate and Jordan also had a positive impact when introduced.
We got away with a generally poor performance, so it’s great after week one to think there is only one team with more points than us.
Just a quick heads-up on the podcast, we have another bonus episode up tomorrow for club members on Patreon. In this one Mike Finnerty chats with Stephen Rochford (whom he met after yesterday’s game) about Donegal, coaching in the modern game and more. Our usual review/preview free episode will be the next one out after that.
Well done Robbie Hennelly. A great kick at the end, judged perfectly and a peno saved and two excellent stops in the first half.
Couldn’t really have been any one else.. Well done Robbie!
Totally deserved MoM award for Robbie. Unfortunately I missed most of the saves due to a gobshite [from Mayo] needlessly jumping up in front of me anytime the ball went near the goal area so only saw them on TV afterwards.
Well deserved, Robbie seems to me that he is in great physical shape, better than any other year this obviously helps with lighting fast reflex type saves as noted on Sunday last.
The latest bonus podcast episode for Patreon club members went online this morning. This one features Mike chatting with Stephen Rochford about Sunday’s game, his role with Donegal, coaching in the modern game and more.
Goalkeepers have such a pivotal role nowadays since the Cluxton era. Hennelly cant be faulted alone for our poor retention of possession from kickouts.
On paper our pair Hennelly /Byrne are a concern. Hopefully Byrne will get some gametime before the championship.
Anyone with information on streaming ofthe Sigerson Cup QF this evening NUI Galway v Letterkenny Institute of Technology – 6.30pm – Dangan.
Is it streamed live?
@true grit.
I know it’s been pointed out but having a dig at Aidan and then thinking he’s 28.Thats not a typo either,that kind of willingness to spout on about one of our own whilst simultaneously not having a notion of the facts really riles people up.
@FBDinsashui
Totally agree with you re that ROD point,surprised it wasn’t on the RTE highlights package.From the ball leaving Robbies foot to Jordan to going over the bar was about 7/8 seconds!
Agree R. O. D point from play and 1 from a free into the same posts were fantastic scores
Personally I think Jordan is made for midfield.
I think his passing is excellent, and he’s well able to field the ball. No doubt there are some aspects to his play that needs a bit of tidying up, and I’m sure there are some who still just won’t let go of his being sent off in the under-20 final. As I’ve seen said before, you’d prefer to be knocking that sort of aggression out of a lad than trying to knock it into him. He does need to be more consistent from game to game, but I thought he was instrumental in our comeback on Sunday.
I’d have him in midfield ahead of Conor Loftus (who’s also a great passer of the ball), Conor I reckon would be a lot more effective in the half forward line rather than Midfield.
Looking forward to Stephen on the podcast.My worst day as a Mayoman was Castlebar in 2019 I was down the tunnel after the game with my son looking for autographs and Stephen came out of Donegal dressing room.I felt sad about it even after the great result…. I feel the same now
Regarding Aidan & kick outs
Donegal deserve a bit of credit, first half they saw that we were a little short (pun intended) around the middle and put up a good press. Second half with Aidan on the pitch they dropped off our kick outs more.
Aidan being on the pitch dictates how teams play against us. It’s easy to look at Aidan coming on and say he’s best as an impact but the facts on the pitch are a bit more nuanced. Had Aidan started, Robbie would almost certainly been able to get some short kick outs out and we would have settled into the game a lot quicker.
My personal opinion is that Aidan last year looked like a man in need of a rest, so I wouldn’t be starting him in the league.
Probably the game that’ll best educate us on whether we can afford not to start him come championship will be the dubs in croker
I’m with you, 1989, and I have to say the same feeling hit me too on Sunday when I saw him in the middle of the Donegal warm-up.
FBDinashui……that was the move of the Match…..Absolutely brilliant restart by Robbie…..Two passes later…..bang……the neutralising of the Donegal penalty effort by matching the point they put over in the resultant 45………Great lift when that Mayo point went over…..
@No Doubt, I was just looking at the voting trying to figure thing’s out.. Robbie was definitely overwhelming Mayo’s best player last Sunday, and 37% of the total vote, while an excellent vote, it’s probably not reflective of his many game changing interventions during the game.. On the other hand IF everyone has 3 votes, for who they believe we’re the 3 best player’s… So if everyone who voted, voted for their 3 best player’s in the match, and everyone who voted for their top 3 player’s voted for Robbie Hennelly, the absolute highest percentage of the votes Robbie Hennelly could get would be 33%.. So my guess at the way the voting works is that, everyone who voted didn’t actually vote for 3 player’s, some must have only voted for ONE player, and it seems overwhelming likely that player was Robbie Hennelly . So if my thinking on this is correct, 37% is actually a phenomenal vote, and well deserved as well.
@Leantimes, Robbie’s “true” vote is just over 76%. Pretty amazing that nearly a quarter of all voters didn’t have Robbie in their top 3 though.
Tommy Conroy went off injured in tonight Sigerson cup game, a big doubt for the Monaghan match now.
@mayomagic
He stayed down while teams went in for half time, hopefully not serious but doesnt sound good.
Doesn’t sound good for sure with T. Conroy. Playing games in heavy pitches always carry a fair degree of risk at that high level. Here’s hoping it’s not too bad.
The last time a NUIG player was down so long with an injury was Sean Mulkerrin a few weeks ago and he was ruled out for the year afterwards. Hopefully Tommy Conroy avoids that anyway.
What type of injury was it ?
NUI Galway were dealt a blow when Tommy Conroy was forced off at the break with an ankle injury
Here it says ankle injury.
https://www.donegallive.ie/news/gaa/734050/late-nui-galway-goal-means-end-of-the-sigerson-road-for-lyit.html
Hopefully. Tommy’s injury is not too bad, it’s pointless speculating .. Nobody can possibly know just yet exactly what type of an injury it is.. Just wishing TC a full and fast recovery!
Western People reporting he went down clutching his knee.
On Twitter they were saying it’s a knee injury.
Jeez it’s typical Mayo luck isn’t it
Here’s hoping Tommy is okay. Best to dial back the speculation on it, we should know the details soon enough.
The Discord chat has now been opened for the Monaghan game, for all you club members out there.
Robbie is very deserving of our Man of the Match and well done to him. I’m just surprised he didn’t get a bigger share of the vote! He is easily the best goalkeeper we have in Mayo at the moment. No one seems to divide our opinion as much as Robbie but we should support him as best we can while he is our No 1.
Great to see Doherty and Harrison back on the pitch again. They bring much needed leadership and big game composure – things that seemed to desert us in last year’s final. Hopefully we’ll see Cillian back for the final few games of the league as it is simply not the same Mayo team without him.
I have not been Robbie’s biggest supporter, in fact, far from it. But you can’t take away what was not far off a flawless performance. Very impressive, and I imagine will do his self-confidence no harm at all.
The free in particular would be one that any of the top deadball specialists in Ireland would be proud of.