Galway 1-14; Mayo 0-16
Padraic Joyce was heading for the scrapheap as a manager if he led his beloved Galway to yet another defeat against Mayo in Castlebar on Sunday, and he knew that best of all.
The two-time All Ireland winner as a player set his team out to do a defending job primarily and then allowed his more creative players to become an influence as the plan worked a treat and left Mayo in dire straits with time no longer their friend.
Mayo to their credit fought tooth and nail to whittle a six-point deficit back to the minimum but at game’s end, it was Joyce who was jumping for joy with his backroom team at the final whistle.
This first win over their fiercest foe on the western front in five years was evident at the outpouring of emotions by the Tribesman players and management and of course supporters at David Coldrick’s last blast on his whistle.
Said Joyce: “The lads deserve that. They have put a lot of work into Galway football the last two or three years and have had a lot of disappointments. Any day you can beat Mayo in Castlebar is a significant win. You have to credit the lads for the character they showed.
“Obviously we didn’t play a full 70 minutes, as we would have liked, but that’s the way big games go. You’ll get your periods and they get their periods, where you try to limit the damage.
“But in the third quarter, our main players were brilliant. Paul Conroy was outstanding, Shane Walsh kicked his three frees in a row, Damien Comer was very, very good, Dessie Conneely when he came on worked very hard. So we’re delighted with them. We hung on in the end but you make your luck and it’s about time we got a turn of luck in these games,” he emphasized.
Mayo boss James Horan was suffering a first loss in seven championship encounters against Galway.
“We went six points down very early and looked to be off it. We grinded it back by half-time but for 15 minutes of the second half we went flat again. You can’t do that against a good team like Galway and hope to win it. We had 17 chances in the second half and kicked seven of them so you’re not going to win anything with that either. We got what we deserved today unfortunately,” he assessed.
Oisín Mullin hamstring injury early in the second half knocked Mayo back and it will be later this week before they know the extent of the injury.
Mayo have time on their hands via the backdoor, though they have travelled this road to reach to All Ireland in the past six seasons so all is not lost by any means.
It does mean though that they will face more exalted opponents down the line.
Said Horan: “We could have four to six weeks to wait so we’ll certainly stick together and work hard to try and be in better shape for the next game.”
What he will bring into the coming weeks with his squad is the fact that they were six points down with two minutes remaining on the clock minus injury time and points by the impressive Lee Keegan, Ryan O'Donoghue, Kevin McLoughlin and Cillian O’Connor, with a brace of frees, meant they had the chance to draw the game but sub Aiden Orme took the wrong option as he launched a Hail Mary effort which sailed miles wide.
Galway had done their homework for this battle and won it with their tactical blueprint which saw double sweepers employed for most of the game to counteract Mayo’s running game.
The sides were level at 0-9 to 1-6 at half-time but you felt Galway had the better sense of how to win the game right through the 70 minutes.
Johnny Heaney’s goal from Damien Comer pass was a case in point while Aidan O’Shea’s slowness of foot and thought was responsible for letting him in for that green flag.
O’Shea will once again be the centre of attention as he played well in many facets of the game but was never a factor in deciding the key moments, other than the negative one mentioned above.
It is this writer’s contention that for some reason Horan and others indulge this player, who if he was in Kerry or Tyrone, would be used as a ball winning full forward to act as a central point for the attack. Mayo don’t have that in their game and too many players have come and gone without making the positive breakthrough needed in the full-forward line that it should be evident at this stage.
So don’t write Mayo off just yet and similarly don’t assume Galway will now go on and beat Roscommon should they meet them in the Connacht final.
It is all to play for with Western teams but Sam won’t be crossing the Shannon any time soon until we see more improvement and consistency in their so-called big wo.
Galway now meet Andy Moran’s Leitrim in the semi-final where they should ease through and build up their confidence while Roscommon should have too much for Sligo, who will be buoyed by the success of their U-20s in the Connacht final from last week.
Galway: C Gleeson; L Silke, S Kelly, J Glynn; D McHugh, J Daly, K Molloy (0-1); P Conroy (0-3), M Tierney; F Ó Laoí, N Daly (0-1), J Heaney (1-1); R Finnerty (0-1), D Comer (0-1), S Walsh (0-5, 0-2f, 0-2 '45) Subs: P Kelly for N Daly (half-time), C McDaid (0-1) for Ó Laoí (45), D Conneely for Finnerty (49), P Kelly for Tierney (65), J McGrath for Glynn (66).
Mayo: R Byrne; L Keegan (0-1), O Mullin, P O Hora; S Coen, M Plunkett, E McLaughlin (0-1); A O’Shea, M Ruane; D O'Connor (0-1), R O'Donoghue (0-4,0-1m), C Loftus; J Carr (0-2), J Doherty, C O'Connor (0-6f) Subs: E Hession for Mullin (39), A Orme for Doherty (49), J Carney for Loftus (58), K McLoughlin (0-1) for Coen (63), D McHale for Carr (67).
Ref: D Coldrick (Meath).
