Moran happy to take it one step at a time

It might be joked Seamus Darby has been on the phone to Andy Moran looking for his goal celebration back but there was something uniquely delightful about the Mayo forward’s reaction to his score on Sunday.

After completing the long road back from last August’s cruciate tear, it was a return plenty of his county’s following took pleasure in on a memorable day in Pearse Stadium.

Yet only a short time ago Moran feared he wasn’t even capable of making an appearance from the bench.

“Three weeks ago there in Belmullet I had a word there with [Mayo team sports psychologist] Kieran Shannon and I said there probably wasn’t 20 minutes in me, but we’ve worked tirelessly.

“I played an As versus Bs game last week and I was involved in training the last two weeks. That’s the return-to-play protocol. That was my return to action.

“I was definitely coming on — that was in the return-to-play for me; to get on at any stage. I thought I would only get on when we were in trouble, to be honest with you, so it was great to come on in that position.”

Moran insists he’s only worth 20 minutes at the moment but hopes the four-week build-up to the Roscommon game will bring him on.

“I’m probably going to have setbacks as well. There are probably going to be nights when I can’t train but thank God that hasn’t happened yet and that’s the reason why I could come on.”

Moran laughed off the impressive ovation he received from the supporters when coming on — “I think they’re sick of listening to me”.

And he felt just as jubilant for Alan Dillon’s first start since recovering from a hip injury as he did for himself.

“If you see what he has been through, and I supposed I made the headlines for being the one that was on telly, but he has been the one that drove me on for the last six months.

“To see him starting a game today was inspirational.”

Mayo are in the habit of talking themselves up because, as James Horan argues, being the underdog hasn’t much suited them.

Moran epitomises that swagger. “The old Irish thing is to talk yourselves down and you can’t do that all the time. We believe we’re a good team, we’re trying to win a Connacht title, we’re trying to challenge later on in the year if it comes to it.”

Moran also revealed Mayo had overlooked the importance of a couple of league games to be right for Sunday’s game. “Our training regime was to peak for this game. It wasn’t to peak in the League and we got a bit of criticism over the last few months because we sacrificed one or two league games to do heavy training.

“When you go out you always try to win but sometimes we were heavy in the legs. It was the right decision.”