With finishing line in sight, tigerish Mayo didn’t falter

It turned out to be an exhilarating, exciting, and excellent game of football did this Allianz Division One decider between Mayo and Kerry.

Both teams spilled their guts in pursuit of a national title and the men from the west finally got the rub of the green where it mattered most — on the scoreboard. They don’t normally accumulate a total of 20 points (3-11) but they needed to yesterday. They kicked countless other potential scores into the grateful arms of Kerry goalkeeper Shane Ryan.

Except one.

That came in the 63rd minute. The scores were level at 2-8 to 1-11.

The dashing Kerry corner-back Graham O’Sullivan tries his luck in front of Hill 16 with a right-footed effort. He’s about 30m out, he strikes into the slight breeze, and the ball drops short into the arms of Mayo goalkeeper Rob Hennelly.

Mayo go on the counter for what seems like the 100th time in the second half. Paddy Durcan finds himself bearing down on the Kingdom’s goal, he’s just outside the ‘D’. He shoots but gets under his shot. The ball is landing on the edge of the parallelogram. No apparent danger until Shane Ryan sprints from his goal-line with his eyes glued on the ball.

He needs to get there but not before Mayo skipper Diarmuid O’Connor draws a fist, dead-butts the ball, sweet as a nut, into the corner of the Kerry net.

Ryan came off his line three times in the first half. He got down smartly to deny Donal Vaughan on the first occasion. He played sweeper brilliantly with his second dash and denied a possible Mayo goal. His third foray from his goal-line ended with Fergal Boland skipping around him and, luckily for Ryan, Boland was content with a fisted point.

That was the difference between Mayo and Kerry in the first half.

Mayo were content with fisting points (three points out of five) whereas Kerry went for the jugular, registering three goals, though only two counted. David Clifford dispossessed Chris Barrett excellently for the other but the referee was blindsided and the umpires played dumb.

Goal disallowed.

Clifford’s footwork, vision and quick thinking for Kerry’s first goal were worth the admission alone.

The whole stadium presumed Clifford was about to perform a double hop. He combines the three basic skills into one move. A half hop, half solo and half hand-pass ending with Gavin Crowley jinking and rattling a goal. Kerry’s second goal was equally impressive.

A great mark by Kerry’s Diarmuid O’Connor and an accurate 30m pass into Dara Moynihan who feds the onrushing Stephen O’Brien to crack an unstoppable shot passed Hennelly.

Half-time brought a halt to this free-flowing game and with it a strange substitution for Kerry.

James O’Donoghue for Dara Moynihan? Strange for three reasons. First, I thought Moynihan was doing a good job for Kerry. Second, the reshuffle saw Tommy Walsh moving further outfield as Chris Barrett was somehow outmuscling Walsh in the air and, third, I have yet to see O’Donoghue really getting the better of Keith Higgins.

James is still a good player, but he’s still to regain that killer ‘step inside’ that made him so lethal five seasons ago. He couldn’t get around Higgins again yesterday. I felt Kerry lost their pace and shape up front once O’Donoghue came on.

This was in contrast to Stephen O’Brien. He was the best Kerry forward yesterday and has been Kerry’s most consistent forward throughout this league.

O’Brien won three brilliant frees off Higgins, Paddy Durcan and Chris Barrett from the 40th to 48th minute which Sean O’Shea duly converted. Direct running with a purpose.

Matthew Ruane was another player who ran with a real purpose yesterday. In the 12th minute he delivered a kick pass to Keith Higgins, continued his run, received the pass back from Higgins and fisted a point to push Mayo 0-3 to 0-1 ahead. In the 48th minute, Ruane, still full of running, kicked another pass inside to Dara Coen, continued his run, received the hand-pass and cut inside Jack Barry.

Cool finish by the DCU student Ruane who showed that he can score goals in both wet and dry conditions and is forming an exciting partnership with Aidan O’Shea.

Aidan is still king of the ‘hop-balls’. Kerry were penalised twice yesterday for stepping over the sideline when trying to execute a line-ball. Big Aidan won both the resultant hop-balls and had a ding-dong battle with Jack Barry all afternoon.

Indeed, there were ding-dong battles all over the pitch and one of the happiest men, from a coaching point of view, will be Donie Buckley. The execution of the tackle was full bloodied and exceptional by players on both sides.

The blocks and the half-blocks, the shadowing and shepherding, the swarming and forcing overcarries was magnificent and this led to end-to-end attacking and counter-attacking from both sides.

It could also be called poor handling and technique in other quarters but I thoroughly enjoyed the physicality of the game.

Mayo dominated possession yesterday, had eight scorers compared to Kerry’s six and didn’t falter when the finishing line approached. Kerry are a young, emerging team and have better days ahead. Neither are anyone’s fools on April 1.