All the pressure on form team Mayo, claims Rebel O’Neill

ALL-IRELAND SFC QUARTER-FINAL:

"I suppose it’s a change, historically when we played Mayo we were probably coming in as favourites and they were coming in as the underdogs,” he said.

“The tables have turned now to a degree and you could say that all the pressure is on Mayo. They probably have been the form team over the past few years, they’ve won four Connacht titles in a row and even in the league this year they gave us a lesson up in Castlebar.

“We’re under no illusions about the task that’s ahead of us, we’re just looking forward to it now, it’s a nice place to be.”

Does he hope Mayo have half an eye on the All-Ireland semi-final?

“With the help of God they will! I’m sure James Horan will have them well screwed-in to the match on Sunday, but one thing that we have in our favour is that we have a good game under our belts.

“We’ve been training hard for the last few weeks, the Munster final was disappointing but since then there has been a good reaction in training. Fellas are champing at the bit to get back in, you can see that by the changes that were made against Sligo.

“The three or four subs that came on pushed us over the line when we needed it when Sligo came back to four or five points, it gave us a bit of a lift.”

O’Neill was glad of the start against Sligo, having been a sub against Tipperary and Kerry.

“I was, along with another good few fellas,” he said. “As was seen through the league, there’s fierce depth in talent within the panel. It’s always hard to pick the team but, in fairness to Brian [Cuthbert], he picks us on training.

“Obviously, you’re disappointed when you’re not starting, whatever the game may be, but I wasn’t going well enough to justify a starting position and there were boys performing better in training than me so I’d nocomplaints. That’s the fairest way to do it and it’s what Brian said he’d do all year.”

He justified his selection by getting into double figures against Sligo. Ten points was a fair tally.

“It’s something I didn’t really think about,” he said, “because we were only focused on the team performance and getting over the line. You can look back at the video analysis then when the game is over and you’ve come out on the right side but I’m just happy to be playing inter-county football again with a run of games.”

O’Neill has famously come back after a third cruciate injury, but he says he never felt his footballing days were over. “It wasn’t as if I was going into the unknown,” he said.

“I don’t know is it a good thing or a bad thing that you know the road ahead of you, I just put the head down in 2013 with [physio] Colin Lane.

“There was never a time I wanted to pack it in, if that thought crossed my mind I’d be wondering what I was doing there at all. It drove me on really, when I was down doing physio and the lads were out on the pitch. Every player wants to play for their county and I’m no different. It pushed me on really and hopefully we’ve seen the back of that injury now.”

He wasn’t totally detached from the squad last year, though.

“In fairness to Conor [Counihan] last year, he kept me on in the background doing water and whatnot,” he said. “I was up with the lads last year against Galway and Dublin and going away after those matches you’d be thinking that, the next time Cork would be back, you’d be there as part of the panel rather than as a spectator or a waterboy.”

O’Neill says the team have parked the Munster final disappointment; they’ve tried to keep the defeat from poisoning their mindset.

“At that time, you’re never thinking about All-Irelands anyway, you’re only taking it one game at a time,” he said.

“Obviously, you’re disappointed but you don’t become a bad team overnight, really, that was our philosophy. In fairness to the management and the players, they took a bit of slack but they came back fighting last week.

“As I say, we’re not dwelling too much on the Munster final, it was just one of those days, we’re just trying to get our house in order for Mayo now this week.”