Barrett backs Mayo to conquer geographical divide

Mayo defender Chris Barrett has rubbished the claim that the county’s geographic location is what has, and will, prevent them from making an All-Ireland breakthrough. That claim was made by their former fitness expert Ed Coughlan in these pages in the days after Mayo’s All-Ireland final replay loss to Dublin in 2016. Coughlan stated that ‘man for man, I see no difference between Dublin and Mayo’ but said because so many Mayo players are based in Dublin, their panel is fragmented and the group in the capital need to give ‘inane commitment’.

“These are the indiscriminate inches that count at the end of a long season,” concluded Coughlan, who spent four years in Mayo’s backroom team earlier this decade.