Tyrone v Mayo - 9th Feb in Omagh - Deferred coverage on TG4

[Bod Mor]

I would be confident this weakness is now obvious to the management and we should expect a more direct style or more of a mix against Kerry. Anyhow the black card will play right into our hands during the summer as I believe it will benefit naturally running teams like us.

It might play into our hands but you have to take into account we could be affected by the black card as well. There was an emphasis last year on the tackle and on turning the ball over, something which Donie Buckley was passionate about. You'd wonder if that good work done last year would have to be re-assessed this year with the black card brought in.
Discipline will be key this year. I'd like to see this team tried out in a few league games:

Hennelly
Cunniffe
Cafferkey
Barrett
Drake
Boyle
Keegan
B Moran
S O'Shea
R Feeney
Higgins
A Gallagher
E Regan (if possible) or M Sweeney
Feeney
A Moran

I know I'm leaving Clarke, Vaughan, McHale, Gibbons, O'Shea, Dillon, Carolan, McLoughlin, C O'Connor, D Coen, Conroy, Varley, Doherty out there as well.
At least we would be able to see who from this bunch can step up to the mark.
I think we need to seriously look a Centre back and I don't think any of our forward spots are really nailed down.
What about this forward line come championship:
Carolan Higgins A.Gallagher
E Regan Feeney A.Moran

You are leaving out Cillian O'Connor from the championship starting 15. Sorry, but that's just madness.

Sorry, i had assumed he was injured! Swap him with Regan so.

whose the feeney at full forward alan? or is richie going to double up?

I had Feeney on the brain. I edited the original post as it should be, of course, Freeman

[mayoman dan]

A full forward line of Regan Andy and Cillian would do some damage. Moysider was talking about finding an extra 10% well getting Cillian Dillon and Andy fully fit and Kevin Mc Loughlin back on form would go a long way toward achieving this.IMO i dont think Dillon is a guaranteed starter this year id like to see a hf line of Higgins Feeney and Mc Loughlin.I know that Regan is unavailable but id imagine that if he keeps shooting the lights out and we need a man with his skill set the situation will resolve itself.

[Syferus]

A full forward line of Regan Andy and Cillian would do some damage. Moysider was talking about finding an extra 10% well getting Cillian Dillon and Andy fully fit and Kevin Mc Loughlin back on form would go a long way toward achieving this.IMO i dont think Dillon is a guaranteed starter this year id like to see a hf line of Higgins Feeney and Mc Loughlin.I know that Regan is unavailable but id imagine that if he keeps shooting the lights out and we need a man with his skill set the situation will resolve itself.

I think Evan has bundles of talent but I think ye are attaching far too much hope to a lad who hasn't really featured at senior at all yet. COC, Freeman and Andy are your best FF line this year, Regan or no Regan.

[Gazza M]

Mayo have a few options at midfield, would you ever consider O'Shea as a target man at full forward? At underage he was a very effective forward although admittedly more around the half forward line.

[mayoman dan]

He was tried at full forward before with limited success. If Parsons or Big Barry can make a mf spot there own alongside Seamus O Se i think cf could be the place for him hes very hard to stop when he builds up ahead of steam.

[Dubhaltach]

Would a few of last years Mayo Minor team come into the reckoning after the U-21 campaign is  over? A few classy forwards in that side like Doherty and Conroy, full of confidence. But still a big step up from Minor to Senior in one year, but worth a shot if they perform well with the u21s

Too soon for them imo. But we may well get something out of the U21 campaign.
I can see Zulu s point about forwards an all but come summer if we get injured players back we will have options. Personally I think we ve kicked too much ball into the ff line fairly aimlessly last 2 finals. We should be running the ball. I select on the basis of gaining primary possession and keeping it. We should play to our strengths, one of which is pace. When we ran at teams last year we got scores from a spread of players.

eh...look back and see how Andy's goal came about, Also look at Brogan's sucker punch in the first half for that matter!

That goal in the final came from a long ball in, one of the few we kicked all day! What let us down was our failure to move away from our traditional style of play, i.e. short passing up the field. We had more than enough possession to win that match yet time after time we attempted to walk the ball from one end of the pitch to the other. The final once again proved that you cant win an all Ireland with this method and its high time we move away from it.

I see the old soundbites about Mayo having no marquee forwards are alive and well. In actual fact Andy, Freeman and Cillian are inside forwards as good as what's out there, the problem is we don't kick early ball into them. By the time any of them usually get the ball, the area is congested, they've no space and they're trying to beat around 6 opposition defenders. The other problem with 'running the ball' is that our half back line gets caught in the opposition half far too often, this leads to an acre of space in front of our full back line. How many times was poor Ger Caff left isolated one on one against Brogan in our three games against the Dubs last year. Brogans goal in the first half of the final being the perfect example of what im on about.

Historically, ourselves and Donegal were renowned for this short passing style of play. I believe its no coincidence that the first Donegal team to fundamentally alter their style also went on to win an all Ireland!

Good debate but I ll stick to my guns.

There was a horrendous stat out there ( some other poster might remember it exactly) that Donegal in 2012 scored something like 2-6 from Mayo kicking ball into a ff line that could not win it and Donegal counter-attacking. Played into Donegal's hands.

We scored a heap of goals and points last year from our running game.

Freeman was the only ff in final last year that looked like he could win early ball but was hauled off for some reason.

I m all for early ball into ff line but we dont win enough of it. If we had a Murphy or a Sheehan or Brogan or Cooper that would be the way to go. In our squad we dont have that go-to unmarkable forward yet. But there s more than one way to win at football.

We did kick a bit more in the 2012 final alright but you have to remeber neither Andy or Freeman started that day. It was probably asking a bit much of a 19 year old Cillian to be the go to man. Some of the execution in the kick passing left a lot to be desired too but I dont think the idea in general was that far off the mark. Had the early goals not gone in......

While there may well be more than one way to win a game of football I cant recall any team that won an All Ireland in the last 20 years where one of their inside forwards didnt stand up and kick a few scores from play in the final. Our running game has been quite productive for us but I think all Ireland finals are a different beasht! On average we usually end up having a spread of about 6 or 7 players scoring a point or two from play and I just cant look past the fact that no team has gone the whole way like that. The Cork team that won in 2010 probably came closest but even then Donnacadh O Connor kicked 3 from play in the final. Anyway, Im of the opinion that the full forward line that started in last years final have what it takes, we just need to get a bit smarter with our tactics.

[moysider]

Can t argue with any of that Dubhaltach. Probably pretty much on the same hymnsheet.

I know a lot of people here think it is all about the players and the marquee forwards. It seems like we have players that are good enough to put up scores until the AI final and then someone flicks a switch and these same players are no longer physically or mentally of the stuff required to win an AI. Then we are lectured to go away and unearth a top quality forward or 2 or forget about it.

In my time we have had the players to win 3/4 AIs but tactics and selection issues did for us. We ve raked over those old coals so often and we don t want to go there again.

Besides, a county that plays in Div 1 and appears in the later stages of the championship regularly, its absurd to suggest that there are no quality forwards coming out of the county.

This 10% thing is catching on. I dont know what the effect of the last 2 losses have on these lads. People assume it will be negative but it is not necessarily so. I d suspect that they are raging to get back to the business end of the year. Yeah it s tough going. But if you re  - we ll say - self employed, a packed diary and schedule is tough going. But an empty diary is tougher because you re sitting on yer hole doing nothing. This is also a young team and still learning its craft imo. Most of this team is still in the development/improving phase.

A pre- injury Andy would give that 10% on his own imo.