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Wasn't much wind but hard to explain just how slippy the pitch got after it got a dump of rain on it just before the game. Lads slipping and sliding, ball like a bar of soap and players dropping shots short as they weren't sure of their footing. Gough got the red card right in fairness. It was a pretty poor hit on an unprotected player. How he ignored the 3rd man hit on Tierney mid way through the 2nd half is mind boggling. It was right in front of him. He's a very strange ref at times.

From the media afterwards.

Shane Walsh was bedridden for two days with flu this week. Padraic Joyce didn't want to start a game without Paul Conroy and Walsh so played him. That's why he was the first player to come off.

Not sure you can take much from the match. With a lead built up and the big wind behind them, Galway played the 2nd half in 2nd gear and started emptying the bench with 25 minutes left to play. One eye already on Tyrone in 2 weeks time. Tierney was back to his league form thankfully. The Galway forwards seem to take it in turns for one of them to have a stormer. Comer the last day. Was Tierney's turn today. Would be nice to see them all or most of them play well together. They'll have to do it eventually to get what they want.

McDaid wasn't far off footballer of the year last year from midfield. I'm loathe to see him moved out of there even though he was an excellent wing-back at underage for Galway. I can see what they are trying to do in getting all the best players on the field together somehow. And they don't seem to want to consider using Conroy as an impact sub yet. While Maher's form has made him difficult to leave out.

Nothing makes you feel old like jubilee teams and Galway 98 are the jubilee team this year.

The brilliant Galway team that ended the county's 32-year wait for Sam Maguire glory in 1998 will be honoured at Sunday's Connacht SFC final in Castlebar.

Managed by John O'Mahony, the Tribesmen upset the odds by beating Mick O'Dwyer's Kildare 1-14 to 1-10 in the All-Ireland final. Current Galway manager Padraic Joyce scored the Galway goal in the second half, while Jarlath Fallon, Michael Donnellan, Kevin Walsh, Derek Savage, Tomas Mannion and Sean Óg de Paor were other stars of the success.

That Galway team went on to win a second All-Ireland in 2001 at Meath's expense after losing the 2000 decider to Kerry after a replay.

Connacht winner will probably get a tougher group than any other Connacht side eliminated earlier lol.

Watched the game on Friday evening, it looks a decent Galway side but as we saw at this level last year Galway were beaten by 14 points by Mayo early on and still ended up winning an All Ireland but the ease at which Galway created goal chances and just ran through Roscommon would make that level of turnaround again seem unlikely.

The Galway full forward is some size for this age group, when he gets motoring he's hard to stop but Galway have it all to do against a very fancied Mayo team on Friday; A lot of chat about them.

That's Sean Walsh from Moycullen. He's some size of a young fella alright. You get young lads who are tall but they might be skinny enough at that age until they fill out but he's already tall and built like a brick shithouse.

[Conroy wasn't great either.]

Galway won 10 out of 39 kickouts but had 26 attempts compared to Roscommon's 18, shows stats aren't everything but Galway won't be winning any All Ireland unless the kickouts improve.

As been covered a shocking 5 minutes from Galway, think every score for Roscommon during the period come from really poor kick passes. I'm sure once they watch the video of the game they'll be disappointed they didn't score around 2-16, they were excellent goal chances for Comer & Kelly who are both normally excellent in front of goal. On a positive note Galway responded very well to going behind and were back 5 points clear within about 10 minutes.

That was a brilliantly worked goal from Roscommon but not sure how their tallest player from himself isolated on Galway's smallest player but even then Sweeney has to understand where the danger is and not vacate the space for an easy goal for Murtagh; Apart from that Sweeney & McGrath were excellent, looked very comfortable at this level.

Walsh's shooting was poor, must have had 3 or 4 wides from play and Conroy wasn't great either. Ian Burke did very well, clearly he was going well in training but you can see why he was picked against a team which is very well organised defensively.

Maher again was excellent with 2 points from play as well as keeping Enda Smith quiet, he's been a huge bonus for Galway. McHugh too had another great game whilst Comer was superb.

Whatever the succession plan for Conroy is needs to start kicking into gear I'm afraid. Conroy has had a great last few years since returning from the double leg break and has been an incredible servant but I'd worry over whether he is going to be able to stick the pace at this advanced stage of his career, ground and matches will both be playing quicker and harder from the group stages on. Last year he was on fire in the league and up to the Q final stage in championship before two really tame performances at the real business end, no coincidence that was when we hit CP and it will be hard to reverse that this year. He has had some good to great performances in the odd game this year as well, but the graph looks to be trending only one way.
The problem is that Galway are very reliant on Conroy and Daly for setting up attacks and unlocking defences with kick passes, neither had their greatest games yesterday. Conroy handles the most ball of any Galway player in every match almost, I don't see any lad that can do the same job that's ready to step in unfortunately. I think this is going to be an issue unless Conroy can find one final Indian summer in him.

Conroy mixed sublime with appalling. His balls for 3 scores, to Heaney, Burke and Tierneys mark were exceptional. The Burke one in particular was outrageous. However, some of his old failings for kicking ball away needlessly is an issue and doesn't tally with games Galway are attempting to control. He had two shockers in the second half. The first in particular at a moment of pressure directly caused Conor Daly's goal chance which shouldve been taken. He really shouldve known better in that moment

However I think back to when our season looked in the doldrums in the second half of the Tyrone game, and Conroy seemingly taking the game over on his own. He's still an absolutely pivotal leadership figure imo and also still the one player id trust to play a ball to unlock a defence (think of the pass to Comer in the league final). That's ahead of John Daly even who himself can't be excused, he's given away a number of stupid balls in the last two games. With two runners now seemingly around him in Maher and McDaid (wherever he fits back in), we can surely find a way to protect his legs on fast pitches.

Incidentally, i'd also have also said Conroy's gets our most touches by far. However I now think its Peter Cooke. The lad is a magnet for the ball in slow play. Whether anything good is coming from that is up for debate

I don't necessarily disagree with any of that, he is hugely important but for me that's the problem in itself as I'm not sure that we can find a way to protect a player as you've outlined in a big match against a serious team, CP just seems to play different and anyone not up to the pitch of it gets left in the dust. We'll miss Conroy when he is gone out of the team and I don't see any natural replacement, which is the worry really.

We don't really have a kicking midfielder to replace Conroy. McDaid and Maher are ball carriers really. Even though McDaid can definitely kick scores. He's not really a foot passer. I think Cooke is probably the best midfield foot passer after Conroy. Young McLaughlin on the panel as well but he's not really a kicker.

Bit of a mixed bag performance today I thought. Roscommon started well but after 10 minutes or so Galway took complete control of the game without looking like pulling away. Limited Roscommon to 3 frees and no scores from play. And the first free they got was given against Cooke very early when both of them were pulling each others jersey.

Got first score of 2nd half to go 5 up and looked in control but the next 10 minutes was pure mad stuff. I actually thought Galway lost their heads a bit. Which shouldn't really be happening at this stage of the team's development. In quick succession Tierney, Conroy and Daly cheaply kicked away possession back to Roscommon under little pressure. I think Roscommon got 1-2 from those turnovers. And were completely energised now. Conroy kicked away another one and they definitely seemed to be losing the head at that stage. Luckily one of the Daly's I think missed his palmed effort at the back post. I'm not sure they would have come back from that. I think it was a Tierney free that settled them down eventually and got them back level. And they regained some control of the game after that. Even though they needed a bit of luck from the ball coming back off the post to Comer.

Comer in fairness was outstanding. Was getting the scores in the first half when it was tight. Got the goal. Got the insurance point. Plus he was back in defence turning ball over, tackling and winning possession. He really is a complete footballer these days. Probably should have buried his goal chance in the first half alright. Midfield was a disappointment . We made no inroads at all on the Roscommon kick out at all. They won 100% of their own kick outs. Carroll was finding Roscommon players drifting into pockets around the 45 and when he went long we weren't winning much breaking ball either. We lost 6 of our own kickouts. Turnovers won us the game really. We had a big advantage in that area and got a huge amount of scores off turnovers.

Fair play to John Maher. That's his 3rd good game in a row now against division 1 sides. Think people presumed he would drop out once McDaid was fit again but he's making it hard to drop him.

Some speed on that Sligo No 19 Walsh. Only seen the 2nd Half, Sligo looked a way better team baser on that. No. 13 fir, Sligo a good player.

Galway better side for first 20 minutes. Went 5 points to 1 up and probably should have been a bit further ahead given how on top they were. Sligo better side either side of half time. Galway on top again for the final quarter when they blew those 3 goal chances. Sligo then with 2 points in the 4 minutes of added time to sneak it.

Galway blew that really. Can't miss those goal chances in the last few minutes. They were gold plated goal chances. Got caught giving the ball away then looking for the winning point and Sligo scored it with pretty much the last fist of the game.

Galway miss 2 great goal chances that would probably have finished the game given the time remaining.

Galway look a serious side. Someone needs to check no14 birth cert because he's a unit. Sligo did Incredibly well to hold galway to 4 pts. Some great last ditch blocks and saves to prevent Galway goals but i wouldnt agree it was that comfortable. The only thing I would say is the galway goal was very fortunate point chance that hit post and they had only 2 wides to our 8 so I wouldn't be waving the white flag yet from our perspective. If we had Eli Rooney inside we would be serious contenders. 4 or 5 of our lads looked very promising and all showed huge bravery at times. If we can finish 3rd in the group I'd be happy and give the semi final a good rattle.

Actually thought Sligo looked a pretty decent side again. Agree on the Galway 14. He went into midfield for every kick out and he must have caught about 5 or 6 kickouts clean. A monsterous young fella. And the captain McGlinchey in midfield was dominant around the middle as well. Galway probably wasteful with goal chances spurned but Sligo again look to have a very competitive underage side.

I watched the game wanting to Roscommon to win but probably more neutral than anything else. Roscommon were very good in so many facets. Ball retentions, setting traps, squeeze defence, clinical etc... but no mention on here about the referee?

I thought the ref had a decent game to be honest. He wasn't fooled by lads (on both sides) diving at various points trying to win frees. He generally waved play on and called it right usually. Think he got the penalty call right as well. I would gladly have taken him over the buck the week before anyway.