O’Mahony: Time is right to step down

THE faintest strains of a familiar song could be heard escaping from one onlooker’s MP3 player as John O’Mahony spoke softly of his decision to step down as Mayo manager on Saturday night.

The melody was Jeff Buckley’s version of ‘Hallelujah’, an appropriately mournful tale of love that has soured and gone stale and which had originally been written and performed by the great Leonard Cohen.

O’Mahony’s love affair with Mayo never soured, not despite its many ups and downs, but the staleness was apparent long before Glen Ryan’s Longford confirmed a parting of the ways.