Mayo’s fall guy shows spring promise for summer road

IF CROAGH PATRICK fell back on its arse, there are people in Mayo would swear it was Austin O’Malley’s fault. He’s so much of a fall guy that when the Ancient Order of Fall Guys hold their annual social, they leave him off the list. Even fall guys need a fall guy.

Never once over the last five seasons has a Mayo manager really, truly, deeply placed his faith in him. The promise of spring gives way each time to nothing more glorious than the bench-and-tracksuit of summer.

Apparently he’s 27 now, time to be getting the message, you’d think.

And yet, he keeps coming back for more — like yesterday, at McHale Park, when his magnificent injury-time point served as a badly-needed mouth-to-mouth job for Mayo’s ailing Allianz NFL Division 1 campaign.

After his booming kick went over, Kerry got just one more chance to save the day. Kieran Donaghy snatched wildly at a low-percentage shot out on the right wing. It went wide. Like, who does this Donaghy kid think he is? Austin O’Malley?

One genius among the Mayo crowd hurled something at Donaghy. He missed. Go on, knock yourself out: yep, in Mayo, even the fans can’t shoot straight.

Yesterday, Donaghy reacted to the missile by making a provocative gesture towards the crowd, scarcely the cleverest response. It was a frustrating day out for him, overall. Unlike Cork last September, and Mayo the September before that, Mayo actually went to the trouble of devising a tactic that might curb Donaghy’s influence.

We’re not talking Mensa stuff here, either. No, just the simple ploy of dropping wing-forward Trevor Mortimer back in front of where rookie full-back Kieran Conroy and Donaghy were grappling with one another. The ploy did what it promised on the tin.

Not that the early portents were good for Mayo. From the throw-in, Tomas Ó Sé said to himself he’d send in a high ball to check the wellbeing of the Mayo full-back line. Teacher Tomas needn’t be a historian to recall that Mayo don’t always pack a top-notch full-back line in their lunchbox.

What do you know, Donaghy knocks it down, Darren O’Sullivan gets bundled over, Bryan Sheehan scores the penalty, there’s barely a minute gone, and Mayo fans in the crowd of about 5,000 gulp hard on their Adam’s Apple.

Yet inside, five minutes, Mayo were level. Wind-supported Kerry couldn’t really shake them off throughout the first half. Conroy and Mortimer made Donaghy sweat for anything he got, and only Darren O’Sullivan caused any panic.

It was level at 1-5 to 0-8 after 29 minutes. Kerry outscored Mayo 0-4 to 0-1 in the remaining minutes of the half, but the three-point interval lead wasn’t much money in the bank — and the bank had the look of Northern Rock about it, too.

Mayo wouldn’t be ones to spoil Kerry, though, and their first transactions with the breeze at their backs were two wides (Alan Dillon and David Heaney), a refusal-to-shoot (Liam O’Malley), and a wild kick (Trevor Mortimer) that dropped out near the corner flag.

Gradually, they settled into it, though. Kerry could get barely a trickle of ball into Donaghy. Sans Paul Galvin, Kerry were ponderous on the breaks. Mayo’s wastage kept Kerry in the game, and, following the return of Darragh Ó Sé in the 49th minute, the visitors were able to forge ahead with two frees from Bryan Sheehan — 0-14 to 1-12.

Mayo might have died then, but didn’t. Conor Mortimer must have been relieved when his 67th minute free went over — he had earlier missed two kickable frees, and another from play that could not have been more perfectly set up for a left-footed kicker.

Kerry came sniffing again. Darren O’Sullivan went to ground under the weight of a David Heaney challenge. Referee Michael Hughes signalled a free. Sheehan rambled over: 25 yards out, a bit to the left, a free that Kerry boss Pat O’Shea would later described as “a bread-and-butter one for Bryan”.

Amazingly, he pulled it wide, perhaps not helped by Mayo’s Peadar Gardiner standing about seven yards in front of him as he kicked it. Then came the O’Malley winner, the Donaghy miss, the William Tell intervention from the bleachers, and the final whistle.

“We conceded 16 points, and it’s hard to outscore that,” was O’Shea’s verdict. But he was “happy to get Darragh back — he’s such an important player for us” and it would be a wise Mayo fan who would place this victory in context: no Galvin, Gooch, Declan O’Sullivan, Killian Young, and not much of Darragh.

“We’re just happy that our work ethic in training paid off — our morale has never dropped in this league,” said Mayo selector Kieran Gallagher.

By the way, fans going home blamed the heavy traffic jams on Austin O’Malley.

Scorers for Mayo: C Mortimer 0-7 (4f), A O’Malley 0-5 (1f), A Dillon 0-2 (2f), J Gill 0-1, A Moran 0-1.

Kerry: B Sheehan 1-5 (1-0 penalty, 5f), D O’Sullivan 0-3, T O Se 0-2, K Donaghy 0-1, E Brosnan 0-1.

MAYO: D Clarke; T Cunniffe, K Conroy, L O’Malley; D Heaney, T Howley, K Higgins; J Gill, R McGarrity; P Gardiner, A Dillon, T Mortimer; C Mortimer, A O’Malley, A Moran.

Subs: C Boyle for L O’Malley (42); T Parsons for J Gill (55); P Harte for A Dillon (67). Blood sub – A Higgins.

KERRY: D Murphy; M Ó Sé, T O’Sullivan, P Reidy; T Ó Sé, T Griffin, A O’Mahony; M Quirke, S Scanlon; D Walsh, E Brosnan, A Maher; Darren O’Sullivan, K Donaghy, B Sheehan.

Subs: D Ó Sé for D Walsh, (49); D Bohane for A Maher, (64); K O’Leary for E Brosnan (68).

Referee: M Hughes (Tyrone).