I was in the vicinity of MacHale Park shortly before throw-in in the first of yesterday evening’s club SFC quarter-finals but only fleetingly so as I was hot-footing it back to the capital at that stage having completed a very enjoyable Croagh Patrick climb a bit earlier on. It was a cracking day for the climb and so it was no surprise that there were hundreds of others on the Reek as we were making our way up and down. It’s the third time I’ve done the climb and I left Murrisk yesterday with a renewed resolve to make it an annual event from now on while I’m able to do it.
The conditions were perfect over the weekend for football too and the senior championship action at MacHale Park yesterday and today has cut the field in the hunt for the Moclair Cup down to the final four. (Meanwhile up in Donegal a ball has yet to be kicked in anger on the club front this year but let’s not go there at the minute).
Yesterday evening, defending champions Castlebar Mitchels recorded a facile 2-12 to 0-7 win over Aghamore while Ballintubber also won pretty much at their ease in the evening’s second fixture, beating Ballaghaderreen by 1-14 to 0-9. Today’s matches, by contrast, were far closer, with Knockmore pulling off the shock of the round as they ousted Breaffy by 1-13 to 0-14 while Garrymore joined them in the last four by overcoming Charlestown on a 1-14 to 1-12 scoreline.
The semi-final draw sees Knockmore paired with Ballintubber – a tie given increased interest by the fact that the North Mayo lads successfully ambushed the Tubbermen in the quarters last year – while Mitchels will play Garrymore. I don’t have my Big Boy’s Book of Mayo GAA Stats to hand but I’d hazard a guess that this must be the furthest Garrymore have gone in the championship since the early Eighties or so. Dates and times for the semis have yet to be set.
I don’t have anything more in the way of details about the weekend’s matches but, happily, Colm Gannon of the Mayo Advertiser does – his informative round-up of the weekend’s club action is here.
Gmore reached semi final in 2001!
Hard to keep the Knockmore boys down, they must be the most consistently competitive club in Mayo over the past 30 or so years. I hope the semis are a double header to make it worthwhile making the trip down. Are Connacht club draws made yet? I was checking the Connacht website recently and could not find any details.
Not sure about the Connacht dates yet, but I spoke toe of our (Knockmore) boys and the semis are on in three weeks time. Thankfully we managed to hold on. I thought the O’Sheas were going to bring Breaffy back into it as they made up for a poor first half by their own standards. Into the last 4 for the 6th year running now. I’m happy tonight, because I honestly didn’t see that one coming!
When is the semi finals will be on hols and I don’t want to miss them hop donegal beat Kerry am sick of kerry
@gc – 1996 i believe was the last time Garrymore made it to semi final stage, lost to a Brady/Mchale lead Ballina.
Semi finals are due to be played on the 27th with final on October 19th to the best of my knowledge
GC is correct, garrymore last made the semi in 2001 and lost to charlestown in ballyhaunis. They played crossmolina in a semi circa 95 in the replay saga of that year.
Good win for Garry alright. I know they were confident and I felt they could beat Charlestown before the game. They made hard work of it though and should have won by more. Parsons was a big loss (calf problem I believe) and only came on with 10mins to go.
I was not at Ballintubber game but apparently Cillian O Connor was lucky to stay on the field…anyone at it see the incident?
Santanico,
My phone has a note of a Mayo v Leitrim Connacht club clash on 19th Oct. How long the note is there or where I got the info I do not know as last time I looked at Connacht GAA I could find no info on Connacht Club competition for 2014. and still cannot either on the ir fixture spreadsheet or under the relevant heading. But 19 Oct seems a likely date for a preliminary round clash with semis on two weeks later and final in mid Nov.
Quick question for those at the games over the weekend – Anyone on display for any of the 8 teams that might be an addition to the Mayo panel next year?
@Andy D – you may well be correct, i know the connaught intermediate championship is on a tight enough deadline and needs to be played out in a timely manner, not sure if the senior is the same but there is ample weekends left to play it out to conclusion.
Cillian was lucky enough not to see red, he got frustrated and hit out over by the press box side line. He was held well on Saturday and in all honesty not too many of the present IC players lit up the quater finals in a manner i would expect them to be able to do playing at club level. It’s been a long year for them, but guys who had aspirations of leading mayo to all ireland glory should be leading their respective clubs from the front
Santanico, sad to say but I wouldn’t expect much off the lads at all.
After a 12 round bout is declared you see a narrow victor jumping around as if he had never fought at all, the narrow loser looks he is on deaths door.
Would be expecting lads who didn’t feature much this year to stand out rather than the regulars to be honest.
Having attender both Quarter finals, a few players , not on county panel, that stood out, in my opinion, were.for, Castlebar Mitchells, Alan Feeney, in defence, Danny Kirby, in mid field( possible full forward ) and Neil Douglas ,in the forwards.
In the second game, Alan Plunket, did well, and Keith Rogers, did well on Killien O Connor, marking him really close, but for a county full back, he would need to have more of a physical presence. Barry Regan,stood out, but played around the middle,I would like to have seen him , playing in his position , at full forward.
For Knockmore, the stand out players, for me ,were Keith Ruttledge and Gerard Gaughan, they were out in front, strong on the ball and they both could score.
For Charlestown, young Jack Reilly, has to be a player for the future, he has great hands, tall ( will get strong), has both feet and can score. I was also impressed with Garrymores, Caoilean Crowe, he is strong and runs direct, at defence, makes things happen.
There was s good football played, in both games, conditions were perfect. Breaffy, appeared too casual , missing simple frees, they have enormous potential and will win a county senior title in the next couple of years.
Looking forward to the Semi finals.
A piece in irish times with James Horan hitting out at the county board.
http://www.irishtimes.com/sport/gaelic-games/gaelic-football/james-horan-hits-out-at-mayo-county-board-1.1929401
No punches pulled by James Horan here:
http://www.irishtimes.com/sport/gaelic-games/gaelic-football/james-horan-hits-out-at-mayo-county-board-1.1929401
Great read in the western people. Top man. He’s a huge loss but he was also a hugely positive influence and the changes he instigated will hopefully remain.
Interesting article. I wonder who he was referring to when he spoke about the local media being determined to tear things down. In fairness some of the comments on here were pretty critical in reference to Donaghy however comments from people with aliases should really be ignored. No one knows who they are at the end of the day.
I assume it was more mainstream criticism from specific identifiable sources he was referring to. And if it is well it should be noted especially by anyone new taking over.
Wow! Fairly hard hitting stuff by James.
I think he is a little defensive on the Ger Cafferky/Donaghy issue. Remember James did not trust Ger to mark Michael Murphy and that cost us an All Ireland.
If everybody does not pull together we will never win Sam. It’s a warning for the new manager.
How can James say that leaving ger on donaghy wasn’t madness, he was completely outmuscled most of the time. We needed no sweeper, we simply needed a player that could physically compete, and we had several of them. Water under the bridge now but it was highlighted all week before the replay.
James is dead right in my opinion about the county board being pussies, they were dictated to by croke park, and should now gracefully step aside and allow real men to do the job they’re supposedly doing.
Someone from our county board should have stepped forward and said “no, we refuse to play the game anywhere other than croke park” and let them deal with it or throw us out of it for 2014. It all reminds me of a particular Midwest radio lad that does commentary on mayos league games, he sounds sorry that we are winning and that the other team are allowing us to win, or if we get a goal it was a slip from the opposites corner back that allowed it, never from our own efforts. He’s a softy and is exactly county board 2014 material.
Interesting interview. Hopefully the dressing room has learned from our experience with Donaghy – understandable that JH is irritated by suggestions that he didn’t have a plan for Donaghy when preparations were probably as good as they could have been. But his plan didn’t work on the day and whoever takes the reins will need to remember that.
I’d also assume he’s referring to mainstream media in Mayo – hopefully neither management nor the team spend much time reading comments online as it could totally mess with their heads!
Hard hitting at the local media but in my opinion he got an easy enough ride with one noteable exception who went overboard after the final last sep.
The Western was hard hitting last week in questioning why Caff was put on Donaghy but I think that is fair game. The national commentators were questioning it also as indeed was everyone that I talked to.
I would hate if James Horan, for whom I have great respect, engaged in petty stuff at this stage. If I had any advice for him it would be to leave it at that and move on.
One former player of the white boots and bleached hair variety was in Castlebar on saturday evening, a lazarus type return on the cards for 2015 possibly.
Little point in JH engaging in score settling (if that’s the correct term) although he’s entitled to express his opinion on his tenure and the issues he encountered. Its amazing how after a period of time that history can be rewritten and i would like to think that history will be more than kind to James and great work he has done with that bunch of lads.
Rightly or wrongly, until a mayo manager delivers the ultimate prize then there will always be a question mark over their achievements.
Jh
1 k kane on m murphy cost us in AIF v donegal
2 keith higgins left on o gara agaisnt dublin for 14 mins cost us also
3 took of seamus o shea and not aiden o shea v dublin also
4 had no plan b for kerry , ger cafferky is a fine full back albeit v short on form and confidence hence no match for k donaghy.
5 4 costly errors that went along way to us not winning all ireland.
not all rosy in the Jh garden and todays interviews is more of a passing of the bucket/blame IMO.
MAYO ABU
Santanico – Do you mean McDonald or Mortimor?
Another player of the bleached hair persuasion gave a master class in forward play in a relegation playoff on Saturday at the age of 40ish!
Pity he wasn’t 25 again.
Not sure where he is coming from on the Donaghy issue. The ball was definitely dropped badly there. Pity as so many other things were spot on.
yeah, it sure seems sensistive of him to deny there was an issue with neutralizing Donaghy…..he could maybe be forgiven for not handling him in the drawn game (although I and many other pointed it out ahead of that game) but there’s no reasonable defense for not dealing with it in the replay. It was entirely predictable.
I ageed with him on the county boards lack of balls.
@ Ado, the Mort.
I would imagine he has serious aspirations of a return, he’s the same age as Dillon so may well feel that he has a kick or two in him yet.
Possibly an impact sub…..then again he’s not too fond of being a sub
Not too many would be cheering the mention of Mortimer returning..threw his toys out of the pram right before an important game if I recall..
Yes,we must be in the off season when the talk turns to the return of Mortimer….
Leave young mort where he is. Mayo don’t need him.
Was at the games on Saturday. Mitchels played ok but aughamore had no answer to their power. They are strong around the middle but it will be interesting to see how they do against top opposition. Bar Patrick Durcan and Neil Douglas they don’t have much pace.
Ballintubber did well against better opposition in ballaghadreen. Andy Moran was well held and only scored one point. I thought the minor player Akram played well. Cillian was tightly marked and reacted to some stuff but it was only pulling and dragging. Alan Plunkett was the star of the show and Ballintubbers defence was solid.
Big surprise seeing breaffy beaten with 4 county players starting. Knockmore are without Shane mchale and just wanted it more. Should be good semi finals.