Mayo dominate one-sided rivalry, but for how long?

For two counties who tradition says there’s never a hair’s breadth between, if recent results of Mayo versus Galway were a boxer’s record you’d be forgiven for thinking this was heavyweight meets lightweight.

The Mayo senior football team is unbeaten in eight of its last nine games against Galway in all competitions with a points difference of +36, winning two times in the Connacht SFC, two times in the All-Ireland Series, a National Football League final and twice in Division One with a draw thrown in too.

Mayo have also won their last four Connacht finals against Galway who have not beaten Mayo in a provincial decider at Pearse Stadium since 2005.

Kevin McStay probably won’t thank me for having written what Padraic Joyce might like to pin on the inside of Galway’s dressing-room door next Sunday but then again, you might argue McStay should pin exactly the same to the inside of Mayo’s as a reminder of why, if they apply themselves, his players can be confident they have all the ability to emerge from Salthill as 2024 champions. This is, after all, a Galway team which was poxed lucky to come through a Connacht semi-final against Sligo who, while excellent on the day, were still unable to earn promotion from this year’s Division Three.

“Sligo bossed the game, they controlled the game and were unlucky they didn’t see it out,” admitted Joyce afterwards.

The Killererin native has experienced six defeats and only one win against Mayo since taking charge of the Tribesmen in 2020 and he was still playing the last time Galway beat the Green and Red in a Connacht final, scoring 1-3 in a one point (2-12 to 1-14) victory at MacHale Park in 2008. Remarkably, the scoreboard read precisely the same when Mayo won the following year’s final in Salthill.

Of course, it hasn’t always been this one-sided and yet, even when Galway enjoyed the upper-hand over Mayo by winning five consecutive matches from 2016 to ’19, including one Connacht quarter-final and two Connacht semi-finals, it was in those same years that Mayo were still managing to contest All-Ireland finals and semi-finals and go toe-to-toe with the greatest Gaelic football team the game has seen while Galway were unable to get beyond a quarter-final, losing to the likes of Tipperary by nine points (’16), Kerry by eight points (’17) and Monaghan by eight points (’18).

It's actually six years since Galway have won a senior game of any description at home to Mayo. Stephen Rochford, now the assistant manager, was in sole charge of Mayo then and, strangely, he could actually never get one over Galway, losing two Connacht semis, one Connacht quarter-final and Mayo’s last Salthill defeat in the 2018 National Football League. Nor did Rochford land a provincial title during his three years at the helm so he, and Kevin McStay, who is aiming to become only the second person to win the Nestor Cup with different counties, are sure to have the bit between the teeth heading to the City of Tribes this Sunday.

But any supporter with even a beginner’s grasp of the rivalry will understand that this fixture, whatever the grade, can on any given day shred the formbook. Take this year’s Connacht U20 Championship as an example, where Mayo finished bottom of all five teams yet were the only team to beat Galway who are now favourites to win next Saturday’s final. Or take the U17 Championship of 2022 where Mayo beat Galway not once but twice in the Connacht Series only to lose convincingly when the teams met for a third time that season, in the All-Ireland final. Anyone who tells you exactly how next Sunday will pan out is a spoofer.

Almost 30,000 paid in to watch the last Mayo v Galway Connacht final in Pearse Stadium but with less than 5,000 showing up for Galway’s semi-final against Sligo earlier this month and under 14,000 watching Mayo overcome Roscommon, and with the stakes for losing a provincial final nothing like they once were, it seems fanciful to imagine Salthill attracting anything close to that figure this Bank Holiday Sunday. But Kevin McStay is nonetheless hoping the Green and Red fans turn up in their droves.

“We’ve a young team, a coming team and a team that we feel can really develop. It’s their first big effort in a Connacht final in a few years and I really believe that the Mayo roar, the Mayo support, can mean an awful lot to us in Salthill,” said the Mayo boss in a social media post just hours after their victory over Roscommon.

The Ballina native has form when it comes to winning a Connacht SFC final against Galway in Pearse Stadium having guided Roscommon to victory over the Kevin Walsh-managed Tribesmen in 2017, on a day where the underdogs out-thought and out-fought their hosts on their way to a nine points victory. He’d settle for a one point cushion on Sunday.

“I’m asking everybody to do their very best to get behind [the players]. In those moments when we need that support, it’s vital that you’re there for the group, and we’re hoping that we’ll pay that back in spades. We know we will because we have a great belief that this team is going in the right direction,” said McStay boldly.

He also believes that Mayo – despite winning last year’s National Football League title – had better control of their schedule and so were in a better place entering this year’s Connacht SFC.

“The rhythm last year was very difficult. We knew about it months in advance so I’m not whinging about it, but it’s very hard to go from a National League title and seven days later be in a championship. It’s a big title to win when you don’t win them regularly and then you have to come back down for championship seven days later.” 

And even though there were three weeks between Derry lifting this year’s league crown and their opening game in Ulster, the reasons behind their demise to Donegal last Saturday week could be similar, he believes. The bigger talking point out of that game however, bigger even than the tightness of the inter-county calendar, was how Donegal destroyed Derry’s use of the fly keeper, scoring three of their four goals while Odhran Lynch was off his line. Less than 24 hours later, Colm Reape was in real danger of incurring the same embarrassment but Roscommon lacked the clinical edge to punish the Mayo stopper who had been robbed of possession just 45-metres from the opposition’s posts. But don’t expect any change in tactics from Mayo just yet.

“The spectators and maybe some of the pundits are only looking at the risks, they forget about the reward,” said Kevin McStay, quite defensively.

“You saw Colm intercept two balls over the top that if a corner-forward runs onto and he stays on the goal-line, it’s now a goal chance. He’s also marking space on the kickouts, there’s so many other strings to what he’s trying to do. He’s trying to keep the keeper away from the side he’s on where we might overload, and all the teams are doing this.

“Not all keepers are able to do what Colm is able to do, so we assess these things too and what’s risky and what’s not risky. There’s risk-reward and if you have a keeper who can do it and you can balance it, great.” 

Reape was Man of the Match when McStay won his first and, so far, only title as Mayo boss, with victory over Galway in last year’s Division 1 final. The hunch is that Mayo should just about Reape further glory on Sunday.