We named our team and subs for Sunday’s National League Round 2 match against Monaghan earlier on today. Here’s the match day panel we’ve announced for Clones:
Mayo (NFL Division One v Monaghan, 6/2/2022): Rob Henelly (Breaffy); Brendan Harrison (Aghamore), Padraig O’Hora (Ballina Stephenites), Lee Keegan (Westport); Paddy Durcan (Castlebar Mitchels), Michael Plunkett (Ballintubber), Eoghan McLaughlin (Westport); Conor O’Shea (Breaffy), Stephen Coen (Hollymount/Carramore, captain); Fionn McDonagh (Westport), Diarmuid O’Connor (Ballintubber), Bryan Walsh (Ballintubber); Aiden Orme (Knockmore), Jason Doherty (Burrishoole), Ryan O’Donoghue (Belmullet). Subs: Rory Byrne (Castlebar Mitchels), Donnacha McHugh (Castlebar Mitchels), Sam Callinan (Ballina Stephenites), Ruairí Keane (Mayo Gaels), Rory Brickenden (Westport), Aidan O’Shea (Breaffy), Jordan Flynn (Crossmolina Deel Rovers), Fergal Boland (Aghamore), Conor Loftus (Crossmolina Deel Rovers), Paul Towey (Charlestown Charlestown Sarsfields), Frank Irwin (Ballina Stephenites).
The team we’ve named shows three changes, one of which is, sadly, enforced, from the side that started against Donegal last Sunday. Into the team come Lee Keegan, Michael Plunkett and Bryan Walsh and they replace Donnacha McHugh, Conor Loftus and the unfortunate Tommy Conroy. There’s a bit of positional shifting too, with captain Stephen Coen moving to midfield as Padraig O’Hora shifts over to full-back, Diarmuid O’Connor switching to the Forty and Aiden Orme moving from there to Tommy’s corner forward berth.
Because we’ve once again named the full 26-man panel, the changes to the bench are also worth a mention. There’s just the one, in fact, with Aghamore’s Fergal Boland replacing Pearse Rutledge of Knockmore.
Best of luck to the lads at St Tiernach’s Park on Sunday.
Think Aido will start, hard to see why not after his performance against Donegal. Wonder how far Oisín is off returning.
COS needs to make an impact.
COS and Mc Donagh need to make an impact. They need to put themselves about and get into the game, for big men they didn’t impose themselves physically last Sunday.
I hope this is the end of the madness of playing Conor Loftus in midfield. He’s undoubtedly a good passer of the ball but his place is in the Half-forward line if he can grab it. Midfield needs physicality, particularly at this time of year. Just look at the impact Aido had when he came on and Flynn also.
The midfield diamond is more solid and experienced this week with Plunkett, Coen and DOC replacing McHugh, Loftus and Orme so we should do better there.
But if it’s not working out let’s not wait until halftime to make the changes, that could have cost us the game last week. Spring Aido after 20 minutes if we’re struggling in the middle with Flynn to follow at halftime.
I hope Orme can make an impression this week. I believe he has potential and the move away from CF may suit him.
I don’t think lee will start, simply based off of last week. I’m not sure who’ll come in instead of him, if there’s a Monaghan forward to be marked, then McHugh, although he was subbed off against Donegal, so there may be a knock involved. Also given the other changes, a forward may come in.
I doubt coen at nine will in practice be much different from coen at 6. Plunkett last year was normally the extra man in defense, essentially as close as we come to playing a sweeper, and I’d expect that to continue.
Loftus on the bench to me suggests he may have a slight knock. For all the criticism he gets, and yes he’s not a natural or traditional midfielder, there’s one simple reason he’s named there – he doesn’t have to chase a nippy half back around the pitch
Similarly, Boland on the bench suggests they’re not sure if the knock he had has cleared up. Could start but equally may not tog
Fionn McDonagh also played sigerson during the week, so will be interesting to see if he starts. I’d assume McLaughlin did too but he’s a bit of freak of nature in that regard, his stamina is ridiculous, he’s almost like having an extra substitute.
Where are the scores coming from? It’s really worrying we are still persisting with a half forward line like that.
Diarmuid has not played well in any sense for a long time. Fionn really hasn’t done a lot either and Bryan Walsh doesn’t offer anything attacking wise. Again we’re depending on 2-3 scores from our half back line and FF line.
Where is James Carr? 6-6 in 8 starts someone said recently and appears to be unwanted or not trusted. Also incredible we are playing Conor O’Shea in midfield based purely off the fact he’s tall.
There’s buckets of potential in James Carr but I can see why the jury is still out. He’s been very hit and miss and has yet to kick on for us.
Paddy half forward anyone?
At least he can score…
Moose79 i would love to see that. It’s been tried in the past and with great success too (2019 Paddy snuffed out Ryan McHugh & Jack McCaffrey, & managed to hit 5 points over those 2 games).
He gave an exhibition in a county final a couple of years ago. Can’t think of exact year, but it was Castlebar v Knockmore. Kevin mc dropped deep as a sweeper. Paddy pushed up and scored 1-3 on the night if I’m not mistaken.
We have a rart of brilliant half backs who can all score. We have a hard working half forward line, but they are not threatening the scoreboard (bar Kevin Mc). Why not take a leaf out of Tyrone’s book and use the abundance of half backs we have and play some of them further forward.
Durcan, Hession & Eoghan McLaughlin would easily slot in as half forwards in my opinion
Moose/Mayo focus agreed 100%.
I was lobbying for that move of paddy to half forward line last year, people forget he won an allstar in 2019 off the back of playing hf against Ryan mchugh and jack mccaffrey and nullifying both.
If not him then hession a possibility too, we are extremely weak in half forward line but have an abundance of strong attacking wing backs so its a no brainer for me, promote one of eoghan/paddy/hession to the half forward line
Prior to his injury, Hession was the best player in the Mayo club championship last year. By some distance.
Paddy or Hession to Hf for me as well
Yes worth a try. Martin ó Connell started at full forward and Geraghty played half forward and half back Reilly played corner forward and corner back. We all complained when Rochford played Keegan in the full back position but if you are the team man marker you need to learn to play in all positions in the backs
Remember in league games you have to try thing’s with an eye to the summer. Some will work some won’t
Pretty sure Eoghan played left half forward at times last year. Against Galway and maybe second half against Dublin. Corresponds with probably our best periods last year. So it has been tried with some success but I wouldn’t think he’d be a regular scorer there, he’s just lacking a little in terms of technique
Hession is probably worth a try there. In terms of driving at and past people, he showed he can do that but he’s very much unproven at top level and IIRC was a little shot shy last year.
Paddy I wouldn’t move. He’s worth a score or two from half back and it doesn’t necessarily mean he’ll score more in the half forwards. There’s not too many guys in the country who guarantee you scores from play outside the full forward line. If there were we wouldn’t be having this debate
Boland is worth a score or two
Darren McHale scored well early in Connacht last year, I don’t think it was a lack of a score that let him down once we hit croker last year
Ryan could also play a bit once cillian comes back
Cillian is the big one for me. What we’re really missing is just that guy who knits everything together. That’s cillian for me
I find it amazing that we can only agree on the best position for one player (mattie) after playing 5 all Ireland finals in 6 years.
If you can’t get the best out of your best players then you can’t win.
I see the down v galway game is on gaago tomorrow. I can’t understand why the same couldn’t be done for the mayo game.
Well it looks like the line I was fed about con o callaghan opting out with dubs turned out to be bs as he us named to start tonight :-p
I still think kerry are going to give them a pasting
Conor Loftus is seriously running out of chances in this Mayo team. How many years has he been in Panel now and still not delivered.
I wouldn’t say he hasn’t delivered. In 2017 he scored a screamer of a goal against Derry to keep us in the championship. Against Kerry, he played a fantastic ball into Andy Moran to set up the 1-2 with Cillian that Andy finished, and he also scored a lovely point in that game.
He’s not a midfielder though, 11 or nowhere in my opinion.
Loftus was excellent in the 2020 final
Consider if he was playing 11 against us, we’d stick paddy durcan on him and paddy would end up outscoring him
Sam Og – that’s not an acceptable way to question the merits of a named player. I’d delete the comment but for the fact that the rather crude way you put forward that point was quickly responded to by others.
I don’t understand how Sam Og’s comment about Loftus is offside.
Is it not permitted to suggest that a player is running out of chances?
Question for the more tech savy than I. When I logged onto gaago to watch the galway game I was pleasantly surprised to see it was paid seemingly from the package I bought in 2021 and I was fully expecting to pay this evening. My question is did the package Carry over to this year? Galway going well again tonight.
P – criticisms need to be specific, to allege someone is “seriously running out of chances” is an extremely lazy-minded allegation and the barb that he “hasn’t delivered” is both insulting and, as others have pointed out, incorrect. I expect those making criticisms of players – which is allowed – to back up what they’re claiming with some solid evidence but that didn’t happen in this instance.
Willie Joe – without at all wanting to be unfair to Conor Loftus, I would have that our most recent championship match would be evidence enough for the proposition that he running out of chances. On a day when all bar 2 or 3 players underperformed Loftus was exceptionally poor in general play and kicked 3 appalling wides that sucked the life out of the team. He was arguably the worst player on the field that day. This was in a season where he was average at best in earlier rounds.
It seems pretty obvious that this is the context for Sam Og’s comment. Would the criticism be more acceptable if he spelled out the obvious? It was hardly a wild or below the belt attack by reasonable standards.
As for the comment that Loftus hasn’t delivered, could anyone seriously suggest that the opposite is true? That Loftus has consistently delivered for Mayo? It is reasonable to point out that he has delivered inconsistent results .
Whether you agree or not with the comment from Sam Og I would have thought it must be within the range of reasonable views capable of being legitimately expressed around here? I don’t know Sam Og and have no particular bone to pick with Conor Loftus either.
On Loftus I have to say I think the issue is he is played out of position.That breaks his confidence in my opinion.I think he could be played anywhere in half forward line.He is just not a midfielder.
I just feel if we are to ever win it the bounce we need will come from a guy like Conor catching fire.He has the talent to do it….and he has in the past also
P – I haven’t taken the comment down, merely pointed out that I’d expect any allegation to be backed up by evidence. You’ve done this and others have argued to the contrary and that’s all fine. I want an informed debate so that does mean that I expect people to quote specifics. That way the validity of claims can be debated whereas generalised put-downs cannot be.
No Con starting for Dublin!
@no doubt
I don’t know the specifics of GAAGO but most things you sign up for online will automatically continue on and charge you when your subscription ends. It’s normally in the small print that you will need to explicitly end your subscription
I’d check your bank statement
Kerry impressive and Dublin look like a shell of themselves.
Why was that Dublin goal ruled out? Fair enough giving a black card but you can’t retrospectively rule out scores for fouls that occur in the build up.
I’ve never seen anyone as good as Clifford.
Conor Lane playing a blinder once again
He sure is, Liberal! That decision to rule out the Dublin goal was completely bizarre, to say nothing of his black carding the wrong Dublin player.
GAA HQ must still favour him giving him a game of this significance! Doesn’t bode well for the summer….
@frostThammer.thanks for the heads up. I didn’t think of that. I must go and check it out
I thought I’d enjoy Dublin’s decline far more than I am. There’s no joy in seeing the standards slip though. It’s just remarkable how blatant their indiscipline is. They at least used to hide it well under Gavin! What an uninspiring second half display from both sides, albeit in dreadful conditions. Could Dublin be heading South? Who would’ve entertained that possibility even 12 months ago?
@frostThammer.my final words on the issue. nothing deducted from account so I’ll see what happens as the weeks go on as regards other games. Thanks anyway.
I find plenty of satisfaction in seeing Dublin getting a tanking to be honest!
The only downside is that its Kerry inflicting the beating.
I just hope the Dubs don’t rediscover their mojo by the time of their next match – hard to see it happening based on the past year.
It’s amazing to see how average the usually outstanding Dublin players are when things are going against them. It’s always been said it’s easy to play when the tails are up.
We’ll see how average they are when we head for Croke Park in two weeks time. Our League record there against Dublin has been very poor over the last ten years so, even before factoring in how we do tomorrow, we’ll be going to HQ with everything to prove.
Dublin don’t have the panel or the discipline of the Jim Gavin era. @No doubt to say Dublin players are average when things are going against them….I don’t think you have seen the last 10 years of Football. Don’t think Kerry are unbeatable either Sean O Se making a meal in trying to get Ciaran Kilkenny in trouble was a disgrace. All Ireland wide open and I personally think 2 teams on display tonight won’t be winning it.
Watching Dublin at the moment puts into perspective what James Horan has managed to do in replacing the guys who retired for Mayo.
correct TommieK. Remember that week when we lost 5 or 6 players to retirement, each of them all-stars and legends.
To have reached the last 2 finals is incredible really – not that it washes away that performance against Tyrone.
Jesus either Marty Morrissey eyesight has a lot in common with Stevie Wonder’s or he’s taken to sarcasm on a monumental level. Such scutter out of him tonight with his Fawning guff about (an expression I will gladly attribute as first being written by our host here) about the Dubs when they were getting roasted and at the same point trailing by at least 8 points. As for the commentators praise of Lane’s performance, good god above. Boris Johnson would be more a credible witness to a lockdown party.
Either ways, whatever is wrong in the Dublin camp I hope it stays wrong or gets worse by the time we play them in Croker. We could do with a result against them in the League to tag on to our semi final win from last year.
I thought Kerry were bang average for the first 23 minutes. The disallowed goal and black card to Scully turned the game on its head. Although in fairness, they really stuck the knife in for those 10 minutes.
A few of those new Dublin lads don’t look up to it at all. Still have about 6 starters to return potentially, but some of them are in their 30s. Kerry only missing Gavin White and David Moran.
To me the Dubs look over coached to the point they don’t exactly know what they are supposed to be doing. They still have a hell of a lot of talent in their panel though.
The media are very strange indeed.
Firstly Conor Lane, can I get an explanation of that decision to rule out the goal. A black card incident followed by an OG by the keeper.
Secondly, Evan Comerford, I keep hearing, “he learned from the best”, “Cluxtons understudy”, “he will be a fine keeper”.
He was terrible last week and again tonight, are we not allowed say it as we see it anymore.
Conor Lane has been terrible for about 7 years.
Just an observation from tonight’s game number one,the amount of feigning injury from the kerry players trying to get opposition players booked, and number two the constant need for the kerry players to be acting the hard men with their pulling and dragging and pushing and shoving a bit like what they tried to do to us in the all ireland semi final replay in 2017
@williejoe. Regarding Dublin players being average I’m referring to the fact when a team is getting hammered even the great dubs can’t do anything about it and I’m well aware of what can happen when we meet them in a couple of weeks they could be thorobreds again. @mayohusband.things were never going against Dublin in the last 10 years. They struggled a bit on a couple of occasions but nothing since the startled earwigs game. I was just trying to make the point that it was more a case of a brilliant panel of players coming together than any reinventing the wheel. If mayo took 2 pasting in a week like the dubs it would be talked about for weeks. Regarding the disallowed goal I presume it was because of the foul off the ball which led to the black card.
Sure that wasn’t the team that won 6 in a row so I can’t figure out people talking about the “Dubs” as if time stood still.
When we win “1 in a row” we might have some entitlement to cast judgment on a team who won 6 when they are doing a rebuilding job.
If we couldn’t win one then I’d rather see Dublin win 10 in a row than see Kerry win one.
Jim Gavin ran everything in a professional manner and I don’t care what anyone says once you remove that then the standards will slip and that’s why I bang this drum all the time, you up the professionalism in every aspect of the set up and all of a sudden performances improve, same players but different standards and until people figure this out we are wasting our time at anything.
Dublin were poor for about 12-15 minutes after incorrect black card.I hope we are not sitting on one point heading to Croker in two weeks.Weather all over is terrible give yourselves time if travelling tomorrow.
Hope it’s not Coen anc COS starting in midfield today as could be a long afternoon. Surely AOS will start given the conditions and his performance last Sunday.