Moran’s men are shooting for the stars

After scoring 3-18 in Salthill and 1-18 against Dublin, Mayo manager Andy Moran said his team are targeting bigger scoring tallies this year.

“Our numbers weren't big enough, no fault of anyone, they just weren't big enough over the last couple of years.

“So you had to get them to a point where you can compete and where you can be… you can see last night Armagh got to 20 points and didn't win the game. So you need to get it to a point where you can compete and really go after the game. So that's what we're trying to do.

“Is that going to leave a few spaces in behind? Absolutely. But last week I think it would have been remiss not to say Rory (Brickenden) got sick the morning of the game.

“Jack (Coyne) got a cut on his knee actually. So we couldn't play either of them, so we left the two of them out and it just left us a bit tight. Donnacha (McHugh) wasn't ready to play last week, we've got him on for a few minutes this week. So our full-back line was a bit tight anyway,” he said.

Mayo’s display against Dublin was ‘a bit like’ Salthill in that there ‘was the good and bad in it’, Moran said, who was not pleased with how Mayo played after Dublin’s Seán MacMahon was sent off.

“We like to control the game when they're down to 14, but I don't think we played really particularly well in the second-half.

“We haven't really went after being down a man or up a man yet in training. So I can't really be too critical of the boys. But I thought we could have been a lot better in that period. Our shooting efficiency still has to go up,” he said.

He said the game was not of the same quality as in Salthill but that Mayo, albeit with an extra man, ‘were a tiny bit more controlled’ against Dublin.

Tommy Conroy is not an injury concern, he added, saying he chose to rest him after his first competitive start seven days previously since the Derry penalty defeat in 2024.

Moran was asked about returning goalkeeper Rob Hennelly and said the Breaffy man has ‘matured’ while playing with Brian Howard and Brian Fenton in Raheny has helped too.

“When you're playing with them fellas, I think it rises your standard. It doesn't drop them, do you know? I think he's learned a lot from it. And himself too, his life has moved on in terms of his family and Orla and his little boy Billy. I think he's matured a lot himself. I think he's in a really good phase. We just need to help him out and make sure that we can make it as easy as possible for him to commute from Dublin and play. We've got two really good understudies there as well. We've got Jack Livingstone from Breaffy, who's a coming keeper and then you have David Dolan from Balla, who's a really, really good keeper as well.” 

Mayo full-back Rory Brickenden was fulsome in his praise for Darragh Beirne, the teenager who has scored two goals in his first two league games.

“Darragh is savage, he has a great left peg on him and he's causing havoc in training. It's great to have the young lads coming in. It's not just Darragh, there's other lads as well,” he said.

When Dublin brought the gap back to just three points midway through the second-half, Brickenden said it was just a case of trusting the players around you.

“We knew we had an extra man, so we just tried to control it the best we could. There was always going to be an extra man somewhere. I trusted the two boys beside me, (Jack) Coyner and (Enda) Hession. So, good trust in them. Just tried to control the game the best we could,” he said.