Both sides winners in tactical battle

The old cliché goes ‘semi-finals are about winning’.

Yesterday at Croke Park, while neither Kerry or Mayo got to experience that high, they both showed a refuse-to-lose attitude that may be more beneficial to the eventual victor in the long run.

In what was comfortably the game of the championship so far, we witnessed two sets of players and two managers trying to outplay, out-think and outperform each other. Leaving Croke Park it was hard to decide who would be the happier with the draw, Mayo, who’d come from four points down after being reduced to 14 men, or Kerry, who came from five points down in the closing stages?