Nearly men of Mayo out to prove a point
The worm has turned. Another meddling World Cup — sent solely to try the GAA — has failed to bring the association crashing to its knees, and tomorrow, out west, further evidence of good health will emerge.
“We’re expecting a full house of about 14,000 people in Carrick-on-Shannon,” confirmed Connacht GAA Secretary Johnny Prenty. “There’s a big interest in Mayo and Leitrim.”
One Mayo paper invoked Simon and Garfunkel’s Sound of Silence to describe the build-up, reflecting the general expectation of a Mayo win. But while the clash lacks the instinctive appeal of Mayo versus Galway, it remains a credible fixture.
And one that hot favourites Mayo — according to goalkeeper John Healy — are approaching with extreme caution.
“Our game against London was a difficult one to prepare for. It was a social trip for our supporters. For us, it was a game to get out of the way. I would expect a much tougher challenge from Leitrim,” he says.
“Traditionally, Leitrim teams don’t beat Mayo, so they won’t lack motivation. But we expect to overcome it. We can look no further than this game, but we have ambitions for a Connacht title and anything less would be a disappointment.”
At any given time, Mayo’s status in the game is a matter of conjecture. Even when — like this year, perhaps — students of the game nationwide don’t include the green and red in the shortlist for All-Ireland glory, the top prize is firmly on the agenda in the sprawling county along the western seaboard.
After ten years of outrageous flirtation with the Sam Maguire, the nearly men of Gaelic football have a desperate, all-consuming desire to clinch the deal.
This year’s cascading run through the early rounds of the league fuelled optimism. A draw with Tyrone in what felt, sounded and looked like championship conditions was followed by a disappointing exit to Galway in the semi-final.
Some were inclined to dismiss the league as irrelevant in the wake of that defeat, but Healy saw plenty of positives and believes those have been carried through to the championship.
“At the start of the league, we had a new panel, a new manager (Mickey Moran), and a new approach. If you asked us then would we be happy to top a very competitive Division 1A, and appear in a league semi-final, we would have,” he explains.
“Okay, it was disappointing the way we went out against Galway. Our performance on the day wasn’t good enough. We didn’t stick to our game-plan.
“A lot of people were talking about how Galway physically bossed us out of that game, but that wasn’t the case. It was just that we played into their hands, and they played to their strengths.
“Our displays against Tyrone and Kerry in the league were better examples of the type of game we want to play.”
The team management may have harboured some reservations about what revelations the Galway game threw up, but they haven’t pressed the panic button.
When they sat down on Thursday night to pick tomorrow’s team, they retained 11 of the players from the Galway clash — in come Conor Mortimer (back from suspension), Dermot Geraghty, Healy’s Ballina clubmate Pat Harte, and Ciaran McDonald, with Trevor Howley, James Gill, Austin O’Malley and Alan Durcan shunted into the sidings.
The returns of Mortimer and McDonald were inevitable, so the tinkering has been kept to a minimum. “The stability is good for the team,” says Healy.
Healy — whose club colleague David Clarke is his inter-county understudy — argues that a post-league trip to Portugal for warm weather training has further cemented the squad.
“It was a very worthwhile trip. We trained twice a day, first at 8am, and we had a lot of meetings, including one-on-one meetings with management. The whole thing was very beneficial for the team,” he adds.
In many ways, Leitrim could be bracketed as nearly men in last year’s championship. They induced panic in Galway and Meath but stopped just short.
All Gaeldom won’t hold its breath at 3.30pm tomorrow, but, for the followers of two counties at least, the first signs of what the season might hold will be revealed in the tight confines of Pairc Sean Mhic Diarmada.
