Mayo Roscommon games are in a league of their own

You really never know for sure what you are going to get in a clash between Mayo and Roscommon.

Despite Mayo’s relative dominance in the fixture over the past generation – Roscommon winning only three of 22 league and championship meetings since 2000 – a clash with the Rossies still instils a certain dread in this writer.

Maybe it is the ghost of 2001 and memories of Eddie Lohan’s late, late winning goal after it appeared like David Nestor had won it for us with a dramatic goal at the other end minutes before.

Remember that? Anyone in the Hyde that day couldn’t forget it.

Nestor went from hero to villain in a few short minutes. Possession for Lohan’s goal began with a sideline ball to Roscommon deep in their own half.

It was Nestor who knocked it out. The ball was coming his way and instead of securing possession, he tried a clever flick over his man. It cleared the Roscommon defender (whose name has never been part of the story) but also crossed the line before Nestor could collect it.

I interviewed him about it in 2004 and he rightly pointed out the ball had a long way to travel between there and the net and there were lots of other players who could have halted its progress.

Which was absolutely true – but we love a fall guy in Mayo and that day it fell to Nestor.

It left Mayo as league champions, Roscommon as Connacht champions and Galway, beaten by Roscommon in the Connacht semi-final, would come through the first year of the back door to win the All-Ireland.

A remarkable feat for three different Connacht counties to win those three titles – an achievement we will be unlikely to witness again.

Victory that day would have added a provincial crown to our league success, which was a big breakthrough in Croke Park after the heartache of 1996 and 1997, and who knows where the year may have ended up.

Instead, punch drunk after that defeat, Westmeath ended our season, fittingly, in the Hyde.

That league success followed by a Connacht loss to Roscommon has become an eerie trend.

Each of the last four times Mayo have been league champions, Roscommon have unceremoniously dumped them out of the Connacht championship.

In 2023, winning the Division 1 final against Galway in Croke Park was followed by a four point loss to the Rossies in the Connacht quarter-final in MacHale Park.

In 2019, Kerry were beaten in Croker but Roscommon beat Mayo in MacHale Park in the Connacht semi-final. Then there was the aforementioned 2001 year and you can add to that Mayo’s league win of 1970.

JJ Cribbin scored 2-1 in the league final win over the great Down team of that era. Famously, he was in Tuam the day of Mayo’s Connacht semi-final against Roscommon but he was in the Cathedral being ordained, and not in Tuam Stadium where Roscommon won 2-10 to 1-9. As he gave out communion at the end of his ordination, he is believed to have asked a well-known GAA personality from Ballyhaunis if there was any result from Tuam. On being told the outcome, he uttered his first expletive as a priest.

So you would have to go all the way back to 1954, fully 72 years ago, for the last time that Mayo won a league and did not lose in Connacht to the Rossies, beating them in the semi-final but losing the final to Galway.

It is especially remarkable for two reasons. Mayo are far from guaranteed to play Roscommon every year in the Connacht championship. From 2001 Mayo have only met Roscommon eleven times in the Connacht championship. It just happens that the fixture has been set in stone every time Mayo have won the league.

And in the 22 league and championship clashes since 2000, Roscommon’s three victories have all been in the immediate aftermath of those Mayo league victories. It has become almost a precondition of a Rossie victory.

So for the superstitious among us, Mayo not making the league final was fortunate. It is hard to argue football can be so pre-determined but it is an incredible set of coincidences.

Perhaps there is something in Roscommon football DNA that sees a Mayo team coming into a game on a high as a perfect opportunity to put manners on them.

There was huge concern in Mayo one weekend in March when the very same weekend Mayo were given a lesson in Tralee, Roscommon defeated Donegal. Kerry and Donegal are well clear of the pack when it comes to most people’s All-Ireland contenders so that was a statement result from Mark Dowd’s side.

People soon forgot about it when Mayo hammered Roscommon in the last league game in Castlebar but to draw many parallels with the Roscommon team that day and what we will see on Sunday would be grossly negligent.

For all the attacking improvements Mayo have carried out this year, Roscommon have looked like a team possessed of more natural forwards.

Enda Smith is back playing the type of football not seen from him since before Lee Keegan did such an incredible job in the 2017 drawn quarter-final. Diarmuid Murtagh has always been a classy operator while Ben O’Carroll, Conor Hand and Daire Cregg are quality too. Cregg can be unmarkable at times but if he fails to get his suspension lifted for a straight red card against New York, it will be a big blow to the Rossies.

From a Mayo perspective, we’ve seen much more good play than bad play this spring but like the little girl with the curl, when Mayo were bad, they were horrid, against Donegal and Kerry.

Both these teams will be hoping they can derail Galway’s five-in-a-row provincial hopes but even getting to the final has a big carrot.

The new All-Ireland series this year is devoid of group stages. The eight provincial finalists will be seeded and have home advantage in the first game, against the next eight seeds (based on league results for non-provincial finalists). Win that, and you are just one win from a quarter-final – the eight winners face off in Round 2A.

Lose, and you are one defeat from exit – the eight losers play off in Round 2B, the winners go through and play the four losers from Round 2A and the four winners from those games complete the quarter-finalists.

So losing on Sunday may not be fatal in terms of the All-Ireland series. But it will be damaging.