‘Deserve’ has got nothing to do with it
THOSE who have spent any time analysing the language used in the run-up to tomorrow’s All Ireland final will have heard the term esprit de corps more than once from Dublin manager Jim Gavin.
Esprit de corps is, according to most sources, equivalent to morale — the capacity of a group’s members to maintain belief in an institution or goal, particularly in the face of opposition or hardship.
Having come through a grilling from Kerry in the semi-final, there is no doubt that Dublin’s belief that they can achieve their ultimate aim of a second All-Ireland title in three seasons has never been as strong.
There is, however, another phrase borrowed from the French, esprit d’escalier, that may be of far more concern to the Dubs this weekend. Esprit d’escalier describes the predicament of thinking of the perfect retort too late.
Jim Gavin and his troops have proven intellectually and tactically agile enough to respond to all that has been thrown at them in games up to now. But what if the response comes too late in tomorrow’s All-Ireland final? What if the actions that have to be taken when the crisis is happening have little or no effect? What if the subs don’t have the same effect they’ve been having all season? And what if it’s too late by the time they find answers to the questions that Mayo are going to pose from the first to the 73rd or 74th minute?
Games, and particularly All-Ireland finals, are over so quickly that no amount of wisdom after the event, no amount of esprit d’escalier, is any good when you’re chasing the game after allowing the important early minutes to pass you by.
Mayo will know all about this after last year’s final.
The handy consensus in the post-match reflections in 2012 was that Mayo lost this game because they shipped two killer blows from Donegal’s two marquee forwards, Michael Murphy and Colm McFadden, early in the game. Kevin Keane became an unfortunate fall-guy and the poor match ups at the back (Murphy v Keane) became a cause celebré during the winter of discontent that followed.
While the early leakage at the back was a factor, it was never the primary reason Mayo didn’t win. The defining acts happened at the other end of the field.
The Donegal defence, with the McGee brothers to the fore, were savagely physical in the early exchanges and they bullied the Mayo forwards out of every single ball that came their way. Of the starting six Mayo forwards only Michael Conroy appeared capable of winning his own ball and eight minutes had elapsed before he became the first Mayo forward to win a ball in the opposition’s half. Even then, that win resulted in a free out near the sideline that was missed.
An entire 15 minutes had passed before Mayo got their first score.
So, while the two early goals were sucker punches, it was the fatal inability of the Mayo forwards to win hard ball under pressure that lay the foundation for the Donegal win. Nothing else cost Mayo as much, and after a summer of consistent excellence, this remains the one nagging concern I have about their chances tomorrow.
But it’s not like Dublin don’t have concerns too.
The remedial action largely worked against Kerry. Kevin O’Brien made way for Philly McMahon after James O’Donoghue had taken him for a goal and a point, Cian O’Sullivan went back on Gooch after the Dr Crokes genius had set up two goals and scored two points off Ger Brennan and Denis Bastick arrived at midfield to turn the game in Dublin’s favour.
But that’s still a lot of running repairs and the danger is that the corrective action might come too late against a team of Mayo’s calibre.
And Mayo are a better team than Kerry.
Where Kerry had players who stand and admire their own work from restarts, sideline balls and set pieces, the Mayo players won’t stop running until they get involved in the move again. It takes energy to track all that constant motion — energy that Dublin usually conserve to burn off teams in the final ten minutes.
Robert Hennelly won’t allow his midfield to be cleaned out as Kerry’s were between the 41st and 60th minute of the semi final, either. In that critical period, Dublin got six points with Kerry’s only response being a tap over free after Jonny Cooper tripped Colm Cooper in the 55th minute.
All six Dublin scores came about either as a result of Brendan Kealy’s kick-out not being secured or from errors from the goalkeeper. Twice in this period the ball was kicked out over the sideline and Kealy’s decision to parry rather than catch a dropping ball in the 50th minute resulted in a Diarmuid Connolly point.
It is unlikely that Mayo or their goalkeeper Hennelly will make those mistakes tomorrow.
Perhaps Mayo’s biggest mistake has already been made with the selection of Cillian O’ Connor. We’ve got to accept that the medical team of Liam and Seán Moffatt know their injured players and the risks involved better than any of us, but Mayo people don’t need to look outside their own county to see that the history of players carrying injuries into All-Ireland finals is not good.
Sixteen years ago, I saw Dermot Flanagan leave the field after seven minutes having carried a hamstring strain into the final. The following year, a clearly injured Glen Ryan suffered at the hands of Ja Fallon and there are plenty of examples from hurling finals in recent years (Henry Shefflin, John Tennyson, James Skehill) to suggest that playing O’ Connor might not be a risk a worth taking.
After the disastrous early starts of 2006 and 2012, much has been made of how important it is for Mayo to avoid a similar fate tomorrow. This has more to do with history and with experience and fails to take into account how a conservative beginning could easily hand Dublin the initiative. If Mayo play defensive from the start tomorrow, they will allow Dublin the platform that they crave from Cluxton’s kick-outs to get their runners on the ball.
It’s a classic catch 22 situation. Do Mayo mind the house in the early exchanges and risk allowing Dublin an extra man on their own kick-out or do they push up on Dublin early and force Cluxton to kick to midfield where Aidan O’Shea could get an early foothold as he did against Donegal? Either way, Mayo are going to have to come up with something different, some x-factor, to win out. This is not the first time Mayo have come into a final proclaiming “that this year is different” and they will be wary of well-wishers telling them that they ‘deserve’ to win an All-Ireland.
As Will Munny says in Clint Eastwood’s Unforgiven, before ignoring Little Bill Dagget’s protests that he doesn’t deserve to die, “deserve has got nothin’ to do with it”.
That said, Mayo have plenty of reasonable grounds for hope without resorting to arguments about entitlement.
Indeed, on the evidence of their performances to date this year, they can, at the very least, go into tomorrow’s decider sharing the determination of another character in Eastwood’s great Western that if they are to fall, it won’t be “for lack of shooting back.”
However, with just 0-3 from the starting six forwards in their semi-final against Tyrone and so many question marks about the fitness of Moran and O’Connor, there are legitimate concerns about Mayo’s firepower.
I expect Cathal Carolan and Michael Conroy to have their say for Mayo before the day is done, but whether or not they have enough ammunition up front to ultimately win this battle is another question entirely.
Sadly, I doubt they have.
