The greater room to improve rest with our rivals

We worry about player burnout, midweek Sigerson, training, weekend county – so let’s hear it for the Western People sports department, indeed the entire backroom team who on Friday night had their annual Western People Mayo Sports Stars Awards gala banquet at Breaffy House Hotel. I am aware of the planning and effort involved in such an august night.

A late night finishing, the sports department next morning headed for the deep south to Tralee to cover a match throwing in at 7:30pm, file a report and ensure the paper is ready for your consumption on Tuesday morning. Not forgetting the return journey and probably a soccer or rugby match or something else to be covered somewhere. Truly, we need to ensure that the scribes don’t suffer burnout either!

So, we are at match day three. Not quite halfway but almost. Matches against our biggest rival plus the country’s top two GAA teams leaves us a body of work to draw on. Galway, Dublin and Kerry, the first three on the list of Sam Maguire greatness. Game one against Galway was a case of blowing off the cobwebs from 2023. A new start, we looked bright and eager, like we always do on presenting for league duty. Galway attempted a passable imitation of our game against Donegal in Ballybofey last season when the roof fell in on the decent Paddy Carr.

Truth be told, that version of Galway shouldn’t re-emerge come championship time. If it does, PJ is toast. What did I learn? Not a lot. Aidan O’Shea goes in for the throw-ins and Ryan O’Donoghue takes the frees if Cillian isn’t playing. I was surprised to see Colm Reape ignored for two kickable long distance frees that missed the mark. Not a breakdown in communication, just no communication. Apart from that, Mayo comfortably beat their rivals and that should gladden those who see any win over Galway as something akin to a spiritual experience.

Next up were the Metropolitans. For this game I embedded in deepest West Dublin, St Peregrine’s GAA club. It was for an Oiche Gaelach, damhasa agus ceoil with the Mayo versus Dublin match on the big screen for bait. I needed not have worried, lovely people and a large sprinkling of Mayos. Aidan went in for the throw-I, the Dubs gave us a fifteen minute lesson on how to play ball. The demise of Jack McCaffrey was exaggerated and the man-boy Ciaran Kilkenny did a passable imitation of Christy Moore’s sweat glands as his fingerprints were on everything good that Dublin did.

For a while it looked grisly but we dragged ourselves back into it, getting a few soft frees (most times we don’t) and converting them. Yet something looked wrong. The full-forward line looked lopsided. Second-half, Dublin built up a head of steam but we didn’t let go. The loudest noise on the night came when Cillian screwed a free from the left wide, followed by another guttural roar when Aido did the same from the right. O’Donoghue boomed over a great point as Dublin clearly tired but the feeling was they could hang on. Then we got a free we normally make a balls of but did the unexpected, crossed it and got an undeserved win. I’ll take it. We often played better and got nothing. And that was it, the céilí started and the women danced. Life in the city moved on.

Onwards to Tralee and almost similar to the Dublin match, it was a turgid first-half for us, hanging in, not letting them out of sight. Clifford, the greater one, with dirty oil in the engine but occasionally turning on the afterburners.

Look, I’ll start at the finish. Like against Dublin, heading to match end and level, we had possession. A man down this time, this is where cuteness and experience forges a team, makes them like that old grizzly Meath side of 1987/88, awkward, knowing how to kill a game. A team to hate playing against.

We win a mark on the right, same spot as a fortnight earlier. Worst case scenario, play it short, run the clock down, settle for a point, a point hard worked for. It’s 71 minutes plus red of 73 total minutes. We don’t. Cue Kerry restart, find a Clifford. Found. Swing of that left wand, voila, over the bar and out the gap. Like us a fortnight earlier, Kerry win a game they didn’t merit.

In the grand scheme of things, us being Mayo will find some excuse for the possession transfer. Indeed, uniquely, we seem the only county ever that factors not winning the league as a masochistic progress. Saturday night’s loss in Kerry allows us a shallow high ground. ‘A man down, long trip south, it’s Kerry, it’s the Cliffords, we didn’t concede a goal, they didn’t score a goal, lookit, lookit, it’s early days yet, yerrah yerrah.’ But we lost a game we should have drawn. If that’s progress, happy days. We won’t have what appears the burden of “winning” the league on our shoulders anymore; Derry or someone else can shoulder that. And do you know what? They will, happily.

The common denominator I took from the three games played is this. Galway, Dublin and Kerry will improve, substantially. We are pretty close to tank full. Watching Dublin against Roscommon earlier in the evening, we lack a Kilkenny, O’Callaghan or Fenton. Kerry have the Cliffords, a currently misfiring Seanie O’Shea and a manager whose won this cup four times. We don’t. What we have is a group of solid honest lads, boys whom have an ability to graft and take learnings (my inner Táiniste and his love of learnings). The rest of the league should be about freeing up those young lads, let new leaders emerge, no looking over shoulders at anyone. Find themselves. We don’t have anyone whose gone up those fabled steps in Croke Park anyway. Let’s spend the remaining league matches looking for lads who can.

Next we head to Tyrone, free from being the main act in the theatre. After that Monaghan, Derry and the Rossies await. Do you get the feeling that everyone is simply marking time until the championship quarter-finals? A feeling you get once jeopardy is removed, golf without a cut, sport where every participant gets a medal and there are no losers only first, second, third placed runners up. What would the Iron Man from Rhode think of it, or Henry ‘The Horse’ Dixon or Noel Tierney? Men who became legends by playing in cutthroat matches balanced on a blade. Win on the day or go home for the year. Yes. I’m getting old.