Number finally up for Mayo
Word to the wise for the criminal fraternity: When Mayo win tomorrow, many soft opportunities for burglary and fraud will dry up overnight.
I was once in the company of a renowned Irish balladeer, a man whose stock in trade is the rebel song. A phone call he took implied there was a problem with the alarm at home.
“Press 1-9-1-6,” advised our patriot, who lived as he sang.
Thus was born a fascination with password psychology. Many lads opt for soccer players’ names or the make of their first car. Or child, if they crashed that car.
Not Mayo lads. A proud people who know and embrace shame; have you ever had cause to share the login or password or pin number of a Mayo man or woman? Each features the daunting digits; 1-9-5-1.
They will all be reset on Monday, after which many felonious heads will be scratched. More pressingly, it gives some indication what’s hanging over Higgins and Dillon and company tomorrow, particularly any of them who work in IT, with access to lots of passwords.
There’s so much security-related self-loathing knocking about in the county, they’d have no chance at all if it wasn’t for Horan. Not James — though he has done his bit — but Liam, his second cousin.
You’ll know Liam from many years in these pages, though he has gone to ground altogether this year, ostensibly to write, and act in, plays, though his absence bears the suspicious hallmarks of a man awaiting the spoils of a great ruse.
Early last year, Horan was invited by the Mayo County Board to lead a committee in investigating what could be done about the delay following up the success of ‘50 and ‘51. A strategic plan for Mayo football, they wanted. Or got anyway, whatever they wanted. I read it first, having easily hacked Horan’s email.
He set out his stall in style, with a dash of what his countyman Eddie Durkan would call ‘oul fancy talk’.
“Those thrilling colours stir something deep within us. We love the jersey, the history it embodies, the permanent prospect of sensation it offers. See it now in your mind’s eye — the rich, traditional green, above the bold, unpredictable red. We’re Mayo! We’re proud! And, yes, we dare to dream!”
He didn’t mean a word of it, of course. Chronic apnea has impaired Horan’s dreams for years. Ingeniously, he and his committee followed up that aspirational gambit with a suite of proposals so forward-thinking and far-reaching there was only one thing the board could possibly do; reject the plan and put in place one of its own instead.
Whatever was in the replacement manifesto, Horan complained it was an old Galway plan with a few names crossed out. But you knew, by the cut of him, he was delighted.
Because hope and dreams had got these lads nowhere and Mayo have reflected far too long on what the history of the green and red embodies. As for strategy, they have plenty on their plate with their yesterdays without worrying about their tomorrows as well.
Horan knew well that today was more than enough for them. And could it be that a loan of someone else’s identity — even Galway’s — with a few bits crossed out, was exactly what was required? We don’t rightly know what identity James Horan has fitted them with, but there is a sense, for a while now, that this is a Mayo team focused on today. Able to travel light despite the wide selection of baggage available to it. Not as flamboyant or unpredictable as some of their predecessors maybe, but lads who have already changed their passwords.
During that terrifying late freefall against Dublin, when many accused the manager of tactical inertia on the line, despite the gluttonous use of substitutes, I’d like to think he was simply allowing a people face up to their old fears and confront them.
Tomorrow, they face a Donegal team who have profitably insisted on being themselves in the face of much opprobrium. Mayo, on the other hand, are taking a welcome break from themselves. Tomorrow night, they will be able to dream again. Sweet dreams.
PS: Horan’s new play The Pull, about a financially-stricken GAA Club, is coming to a venue near you shortly. I’d say he’ll let you in for free. Sure he’ll have his money made.
PPS: Not sure about the apnea.
