MINUTES after masterminding his triumphant return to the Mayo helm with victory over Kerry a week last Sunday, John O’Mahony issued a stark word of warning about the prospect of taking a brace of valuable league points from his side’s meeting with Donegal in Ballybofey. His prim and proper judgement was proven accurate and correct as the Mayo ship ran aground when seemingly destined for safe harbour, after a fortuitous goal eight minutes from the end brought parity to affairs at McCumhaill Park. The goal should have prompted O’Mahony’s men to victory but instead they faded alarmingly in the closing moments, and it was the locals who responded more proficiently, flattening Mayo in a matter of minutes with a trio of late points from Kevin McMenamin (two) and substitute Colm McFadden, sealing a hard earned 1-13 to 1-10 win.
There was no mistaking the manager’s displeasure at losing ground in
Division 1A, when he emerged from the Mayo dressing-room, having spoken to his troops for more than 40 minutes after the final whistle.
“It’s disappointing. It was always going to be a tough game. At half time I felt we had fought back well because they could have overrun us in the first 10-15 minutes. In the second half we gave them the run on us again but we got back level. I suppose we had a couple of chances after that and it’s disappointing that we didn’t finish them off.
“The game transpired as I had read it before hand but now that it’s over I do feel we could have won it because they were a little vulnerable after we got the goal and we didn’t expose that well enough. That is something we’re going to have to learn as the year progresses,” confessed O’Mahony.
“Donegal hit the ground running but at the same time the maximum lead they had was three points and we reeled them back in very well, so I wasn’t really worried at that stage. We got ourselves into that situation but we stayed with them well and the real disappointment is that we failed to kick on from the goal to go on and win the game.
We should have driven on. Second halves always come to the juncture when you need to kick on and the team that succeeds in doing so wins. Donegal did it today and we didn’t and we’ve got to learn how to put teams away.
“League points are vital and we have four away games this year and we did feel this was a game to target to get something out of on the road. I would have been happy enough with a draw here at the end but we are disappointed because we are putting a huge effort into this. We were always going to have setbacks in the 2007 and this is one. Now it’s about how we react when we return to league action against Limerick in two weeks time,” the manager continued, before conceding that there is a lot of work to do, in terms of fine tuning between now and championship.
While four of his six starting forwards were replaced on Sunday, Johno stressed that that had as much to do with trying different combinations as with individual poor form, although he did admit there is room for vast improvement in many quarters.
“I suppose we just don’t have a rhythm in the forward line as yet but also it’s about seeing players. We’ve seen 23 or 24 players now and it is a learning curve, for management too, and we want to see guys as things move on.
“Fellas who show something in trials and training dictate the pecking order and it does change from game to game. Aidan Campbell came in there today and he’s one, for example, who will have to get a longer game to express himself. In a game like that you hope something will happen for you in a 10-15 minute spell because for 50 minutes I suppose it wasn’t happening as much as we’d have liked.
“We won most of the midfield battle to be honest and very little would have changed in strategy but there are a few things tactically that didn’t work as well as they should have and everyone has to look at themselves. We (management) have to look at the overall performance, players have to look at what they did and didn’t do and how they can improve for the next day. We have to move on and upwards hopefully,” he declared.
With a fortnight to prepare for the visit of Limerick, O’Mahony is bound to use Saturday’s challenge against Paidi " Sé’s Clare as a further means of imposing his style and authority on the group.
“We’ll have a team there anyway though we have a number of things on next week as regards fitness evaluations but we’ll be having a look at more guys and we’ll field a good team. The main attraction will be Paidi " Sé, however, and we’ll give the stage to him on Saturday night,” he quipped.
