Green and Red must rediscover the spark that lights fireworks

For the institution that is the Connacht Final, Sunday was a good day. For the Connacht championship, and the teams that sail within her, the verdict is nothing like as clear cut. More on that anon.

It’s customary, after big games of this nature, to reflect afterwards on what the result, and the hundreds of moments leading up to it, mean for the teams involved, but to do so after Galway’s one-point win over Mayo feels somewhat revisionist.

Kevin McStay wasn’t wrong after the game when he said, “Losing by a point, okay, it's not nice, but it's not a million miles away from winning by a point.” Mentally, it’s a different world, but in sporting terms, there were too many hair’s breadth moments to draw outrageous conclusions from what we saw in Pearse Stadium.

Would every referee have penalised Conor Loftus for overcarrying in the fifth minute of stoppage time, giving Connor Gleeson the chance to float over his winning score? Absolutely not, and if a different referee gave a free out to the Crossmolina man, chances are Mayo slow it down, hold possession and maybe even get the final score of the game.

Would every referee have penalised Sam Callinan for his tackle on Daniel O’Flaherty before that? Chances are, the majority would, if the attacking team is a point down. If they’re a point up, or level? That’s another story.

But then, would Mayo have been a point up at that stage if Rory Brickenden hadn’t somehow managed to block John Maher’s shot and knock the ball into Liam Silke just a foot outside his own goal-line, and still somehow not have the ball bounce into the net? The rubs of the green didn’t all go the same way, let’s not forget.

Of course, if Galway had got a goal there, perhaps Mayo come out and chase the game earlier? Look what happened when the home side took their first lead of the game through Shane Walsh after 61 minutes – Mayo responded brilliantly, kicking four of the next five points in their best spell of attacking football at any point in the contest. Maybe they just needed to be roused earlier, and they were like a horse who idles in front, so needed their rival to come forward and pick up the running..

Then there are the absentees. Kevin McStay said of team captain Paddy Durcan that “we could probably have played him for a while, but the bigger picture is that there are three big round robin games”, while Pádraic Joyce had Cillian McDaid in his 26, but didn’t give him any game time. Put Durcan and McDaid back into these two teams, and suddenly you have a very different contest with those talismanic figures in the mix.

There are too many ifs and buts and maybes to make sweeping football statements about the health of the Galway or Mayo senior teams, beyond the fact that this was perceived as a one-point game by the bookmaking community in the week leading up to the contest, and if the teams were to meet again, then it’s unlikely that the lines would be any different.

However when it comes to the value of winning a Connacht title, that was re-affirmed in Salthill, even if McStay did hint otherwise with his reference to how they chose to save Durcan for other days ahead.

Of course there is an element of how, when it’s Galway versus Mayo, it’s not the silverware that matters nearly as much as simply finding a way to beat the other team – but even so, both managers confirmed afterwards that winning the Nestor Cup meant a lot to them, and that they weren’t concerned about the route to Sam so much as the value of taking momentum and form into the All-Ireland series.

More importantly, the players played in that spirit. Have a look back at the angst in Matthew Ruane’s face when Mayo dispossessed Céin Darcy with Connor Gleeson out of his goal, and Ryan O’Donoghue attempted to find the net with the free kick from 50 metres out instead of floating the ball into his midfielder.

Likewise, look at the raw sense of frustration in Séan Kelly and Damien Comer when Kelly takes a free from a couple of metres too far forward, and David Gough calls back the play just as Comer is about to turn and drive at goal. This was not a ‘we have bigger fish to fry’ contest, so much as it was a battle to fillet the opposition, and leave them floundering, or displaiced (Sorry!).

Just under 20,000 supporters filed into Pearse Stadium at a time when there have never been more games for fans to try and attend, and certainly never as many in such a short burst of time. Many were going to their second game of the weekend, following on from Mayo’s minor clash with Leitrim on Friday night and Galway’s disappointing U20 Connacht final against Roscommon on Saturday. A few Mayo fans may even have wandered into that one for a look, in part because it was played in MacHale Park, and in part to get away from the rugby.

So the fans came early to Galway City, they created a sense of occasion, and with the possible exception of Dublin’s meeting with Mayo on the third weekend of June, it’s likely that this will be a bigger crowd than will attend any All-Ireland series game prior to the knockout stages. Possibly, a bigger crowd than we’ll see in any All-Ireland series game prior to the quarter-finals.

Then, when the result was confirmed, the outpouring of joy from the Galway supporters who rushed onto the field was undeniable, further franking the fact that the sanctity of the Connacht Final was preserved.

But what of the general health of Connacht Football, when viewed through the prism of the two leading powers? That, on the other hand, is a much murkier picture. Already it looks and feels as if Roscommon are slipping back out of that mezzanine tier of teams that are capable of upsetting a major power, even if winning the big prize was always beyond them. Both Galway and Mayo too are still a long way short of their peak 2023 form.

All the caveats listed above still apply to the two sides and both teams have real scope for improvement, but they each absolutely need to find it, and plenty of it, soon.

Ironically, Mayo looked a lot closer to the finished article, based on the game as a whole. Ryan O’Donoghue made a slow start and even after his majestic score in the second half, he really didn’t catch fire, while Tommy Conroy can do great things but the output level is still a long way short of what he’d like. Nonetheless there were a number of different scoring threats on the Mayo side.

The bench impact was limited, despite the proven quality of the players that were brought on, so that should improve straight away and the one-on-one defending and competitiveness at midfield was all in good working order.

But how far can this group hope to develop, given the explosiveness of the Kerry attack, and the relentless onward march of the Dubs? Where will the spark come from to set off the traditional Mayo fireworks? If there’s an answer to those questions, it’s not immediately apparent.

Galway will hope that their ceiling is a little higher, but they’ve a lot more work to get there, as there are a lot of loose ends that Pádraic Joyce and his team need to tidy up before the league champions come to town. Mayo failed to punish a couple of sloppy, shorter kickouts and when restarts went long, the visitors had the better of that too. Outside of Comer and Finnerty, the rest of the starting team scored 0-3 between them – a point from Johnny Heaney early in the second-half, and two frees from Gleeson. It’s not that that was about misses either, as Galway only had three wides in total – if you include a missed goal chance by Damien Comer that resulted in a free anyway.

Add in the return of McDaid and Matthew Tierney getting a couple of steps closer to full fitness, and there are the green shoots of a revival showing, but getting enough growth in before the games get meaningful this summer is another matter entirely, particularly when a stung and scathed Derry side is next on the agenda.

The Connacht final is as special as ever. Connacht football however, has possibly lost a little bit of value off its stock in the last 12 months, and if Mayo are to be the drivers of a rally (no more puns, I promise) then they need to make sure both Cavan and Roscommon are roadkill on their journey back to meet the Dubs one more time in early June.