Great weather, great win in Salthill.
No point dwelling on the performances of the match winning full forward line as it was obvious to all, I would question whether they will get as accommodating a defence again this year but in fairness, all three players had stages where they did wreck. Kelly, Walsh, Finnerty and Comer all came out on top in their match ups, Galway were always likely going to win if that transpired. The fortuitous second goal really blew the game open for Galway, but it was the result of good play prior to the ball coming back off the post and Kelly was live to it like a good forward should be, the finish was top class.
McHugh has turned into a really important player for Galway, I must admit that I couldn’t see it when he started lining out in the Senior jersey, looked a limited player who didn’t have any outstanding physical attributes. Boy was I totally wrong, he’s an integral part of that Galway setup now and is basically giving a consistent 7/8 out of 10 performance every time he lines out, have to have lads like that who will just be solid and reliable.
One player definitely pegged from a good bit out is John Daly, who first stood out in a big way to me when Mayo overran Galway in Limerick, he was the youngest player on the pitch and there was more fight, effort and solid play coming from him that day in the face of adversity than many of the other more vaunted players who basically folded up the tent and didn’t want to know about it. Not sure there is another player in Galway that has his football nous, an unbelievable reader of the game. Serious injuries are the only thing that has held him back and here’s hoping he gets a long healthy run now, a vital player for Galway.
McDaid in the last two games has shown glimpses of the potential player he looked at U21 level, he has a level of natural athletic ability that Galway generally don’t have in the squad compared to the half back athlete factory over the border in Mayo. Roscommon had to change their tactics and personnel at ht purely on the basis of his 1st half performance, this is a player affecting the oppositions game in a manner that can only provide dividends moving forward as he will have to be accounted for, another man who will hopefully get an injury free run now.
Conroy wasn’t as important the last day – he still kicked a trademark long range score in injury time – but it’s no harm that Galway could play well with one of the main men only having an average enough game by his standards.
Such a change from the spring on the board
"Realistically where are Galway going conceding 3-10 at home to the likes of Offaly? Absolutely ridiculous. Worrying signs the last two weeks, you'll get away with that type of slack and mistake laden performance against lower Division Two standard teams, but will be blown out of it against serious opposition who won't give up a big score.
Have the three best teams left to play and I hope that Galway go up purely because we will fall even further behind Division One standard if they don't, the gulf is big enough as it is. Will be a difficult task though, 10 points mightn't be enough to go up given the huge imbalance in the Division, needless to say, anything bar a win against Clare and Galway will be in serious bother.
As for the championship will be looking for a good run in backdoor unless something serious changes between now and April 24th, a top level Division One team like Mayo are not going to give up cheap scores and will wreck a defensive setup that's letting in huge scores against Cork and Offaly.. Went into this league hoping to see some big improvements on 3 things: kickouts, defence setup and score conversion rate. When you see the calibre of opposition at this level, there is no improvement on the first two aspects and that level of performance today just isn't good enough.
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You may as well have quoted me on that one Seafoid!
Would 100% stand by that assessment as it was at the time, the defensive system that showed up against Mayo was not seen during the league in matches I attended at least, watching a poor Cork outfit walk through to score a big total in PUC wasn’t great viewing at all. However, even accounting for the “garbage time” scoring, it was still a total of 2-16 conceded the last day and some of the Rossies wides in the first half were reasonable chances that they would have expected to execute. The defence has numbers back and there were some nice swarm tackles but at times the opposition is still getting through far too easily, I’d put it firmly in the work in progress column.
In mitigation against that, the score conversion rate has definitely improved, they are putting away a greater proportion of chances compared to previous years and even the first half wides from McDaid and Comer last Sunday were the correct option to take on which is all you can ask for. Couldn’t fault their efficiency in front of the posts at the moment, obviously vital to maintain that moving into the Q-final. Walsh, who has had issues with simple enough frees in the past, has been absolute money with placed balls in the championship so far, Galway need that to continue.
However, the kick outs have improved marginally but when the fat was in the fire coming down the stretch against Mayo and to a lesser extent against Roscommon, Galway still have not shown that they have “go to” kickouts that will ensure they keep the ball when the pressure is on. Stats for the kickouts last Sunday were well in favour of the Rossies and the limitations of the Galway kickout will be the eventual end of this team IMO. Reasonable success on the overload kickout during the first half in particular and there were a number of better instances of working a short kickout to Silke, but we saw with the two misfires to Jack Glynn out over the sideline where Gleeson’s limits are. Even watching his short kick out warmups prior to throw in, his placement on the ball was always a fraction off, bouncing in front or slightly to the side of the coach receiving the ball. Assuming that this wasn’t the objective of the drill for ball placement, then, ideally, they should be going straight into the chest or catching radius of the target, the top lads at that position are hitting it so well you couldn’t hand the ball off to a player better.
Anyway, it is currently looking a lot better at the moment than it was in the league, no point getting carried away, but PJ basically had to get promotion, then beat a superior Mayo team on their patch and win Connacht beating the other provincial big gun in the final to keep his job, that’s been done. A Q-final win now and it’s been a good year, the vagaries of the draw will play a part in that but given that Dublin and Kerry are on the opposite side of the draw that means the two stand out teams aren’t in the way, plenty of teams left that could beat each other depending on the day, what response we will see from Tyrone and Mayo next weekend will be key to the remainder of the championship as well.
For me Galway haven’t showed enough yet to firmly move themselves past a number of other teams who are of a similar enough level, what Galway have done is put themselves in a fantastic position to improve and make this a memorable summer journey, no guarantees that it won’t end at the Q-final stage but there is potential now to build on the year to date. We are not quite playing with house money yet but if Galway get past the Q-final, then there’s an opportunity there that hasn’t come along in years.
