Horan rues Mayo mistakes

Mayo manager James Horan rued his side's error count as Kerry got the better of them in today's All-Ireland SFC semi-final at Croke Park.

The Connacht champions only registered four wides over the course of the 70 minutes, but there were plenty of other missed scoring opportunities and they coughed up possession at crucial stages.

At least three efforts from the Mayo attack dropped short into the hands of Kerry goalkeeper Brendan Kealy in the opening 21 minutes, while the Kingdom custodian also pulled off two saves during this spell.

"The scoreline (1-20 to 1-11) is slightly irrelevant to be honest. We had a goal chance at the end, I suppose, to make it more closer, but at that stage Kerry were on top and ran out deserved winners," explained Horan.

"What it boiled down to for me was that we made too many mistakes, carried the ball into tackles maybe too often and took shots under too much pressure.

"We kicked away some soft passes which Kerry got. Once they had the ball in their hands, they were retaining it very well and waiting for the movement inside.

"They got some easy scores. We made too many mistakes to win an All-Ireland semi-final."

Mayo fielded a somewhat youthful side, with the majority of their starting line-up participating in their first All-Ireland semi-final at this level.

Horan, who was appointed last September, says that 2011 has been a year where there have been marked signs of improvement from the squad, but that there is still plenty to learn.

"We are definitely improving as a team. I suppose we made significant improvement in certain areas, but you saw some of the gaps today," he said.

"Kerry exposed some of the gaps which we maybe need to target for the next adventure. That's what we need to do - just take it on the chin and go away and improve."

Colm Cooper certainly caused the Mayo defence huge problems as the game progressed, and the Kerry captain finished with a 1-7 haul.

While Horan praised the contribution Cooper made, he felt that a lot of his scores came as a result of sloppy defending from his side.

"Colm was good today, I suppose the goal that he got was from our side a pretty soft goal to give away.

"Particularly the timing of it was crucial after us just getting our goal. That was a killer, he got a few good scores.

"He is a brilliant player, but I think some of the scores he got today were as a result of average defending. Kerry were getting a lot of breaking ball and that's where they were getting the momentum."