Result belies display by Kelly’s crestfallen Mayo League heroes

Joe Kelly rued the timing of the concession of the second and third goals as his side came up just short in Sunday’s FAI Oscar Traynor Cup final.

Tactically, Mayo had the better of Waterford & District League for large periods and forced them into more direct play. The Mayo League manager felt his was the better team ‘for large periods’ and ‘gave them plenty to worry about’ but mistakes at crucial moments cost the home side dearly.

“Our game plan was to sit in and counter. It worked well. I think everyone will admit there was probably a couple of mistakes that led to two of their goals that we wouldn't be happy with generally, but I thought for large periods we gave them plenty to worry about.

“For a team that was regarded to be supposedly a few levels above us, I think it showed today that genuinely wasn’t the case. I thought we were well up there, you know. So my overriding emotion is disappointment but very, very proud.

“I suppose we had two very important messages we gave to the players. One was that, regardless of who we were playing, we didn't want to concede early in the game. I think we did that pretty well in the first-half.

“We took in a little bit of water for a while, then we settled, we played well, and we got caught with a poor goal. And then at half time, we were 2-1 down, but we spoke to them about the next goal being the goal that would win the game. I knew it would only bring us back level, but it was going to give us the momentum swing and for them to score three or four minutes into that second-half, it was criminal on our behalf. That kind of took the sting out of it for us then for about 15 minutes to recover mentally.” 

While Waterford created less chances than Mayo, they were clinical when it mattered while Darren Browne and Ben Edeh saw gilt-edged chances go astray.

“When they did get up, they genuinely worried us with their shots, they generally hit the target with them,” admitted Kelly.

“The first real chance of the game came to us when Ben went through. Nine times out of ten, Ben slots that away. You get the first goal, you're getting forward momentum. I think it probably fell on his wrong side. He's not predominantly left-footed. He'd be very strong right-footed player. So I think he tried to execute with his left foot and he didn't get a good contact with it.” 

Mayo’s best player on the pitch was Mark Cunningham. The build-up to the game was a very difficult one for the Castlebar Celtic defender following the passing of his mum Annemarie earlier in the week but he performed exceptionally well and Joe Kelly was at a loss as to why he had not been named Man-of-the-Match.

“I think the only thing that didn't happen for Mark today was the result. I thought he was the standout player on the pitch and you can quote me on this: I thought giving [Luke White] man-of-the-match was, I thought, a bizarre decision. Not only was Mark better than him but I thought our own number six Oran Groarke was miles ahead of him also. Whoever selected him fair play to them but they must have had their blinkers on.” 

Regardless of the result, it has been a tremendous journey for the Mayo League in the competition and Kelly said that “Mayo soccer is back on the map”.

“We set out last September with trying to put the county team in Mayo back on the map, trying to get an atmosphere within the county that people would buy into soccer again. Slowly but surely, it was first the players, then the supporters.

“People don't see the wet nights here, the Thursday nights you're traveling up from Limerick and Galway in college, you're eating a pizza and you're out the door again at half eleven at night. There's nothing super about having to do that, but those lads have had more of those nights and they've done it for us week in, week out, and we are super, super proud of the effort.”