Mayo v Galway 26.6.11

[ross matt]

My God, Galway were a shambles. Its a while since I've seen anything as pathetic on a GAA field as a team sending on a lad with one fully working leg who clearly couldn't run in the warm up to try and save a game, Meehan should have been nowhere that pitch and was more likely to end his own career than drag Galway back into it. That was the worst display I have witnessed by a Galway team against Mayo in a quarter of a century of going to derby games and it will take more than an under 21 win over Cavan to turn things around.

As for us, while there is no such thing as a bad win against Galway, it was a poor enough display. The free taking was another unbelievable mess and the Ros fans I was talking to after the game reckon they'll just need to turn up at the Hyde to win. Typical annoying Rossie attitude but hard to argue with them based on today.
On the plus side I thought SOS put down a marker in midfield, Vaughan did well at CHB and McLoughlin got through a power of work all over the field, he is a real natural footballer. As I am currently in a good mood I will leave the numerous negatives for later because I don't want to depress myself...

Is that the same Ross fan that always is ignorant to you when they win games? You need to be careful Cosmo. You could be the victim of a stalker. Ps do you regularly meet a talking rabbit also called Harvey?

No Ive never met that rabbit, I'll let you know if I do. The 2001 stuff (which I presume you are referring to as its the last time I saw you win) is well documented by many posters including myself elsewhere on these boards. The lads today were actually fairly sound, and also very (annoyingly) confident (if youre a Mayo fan). As I said, they had reason to be after what they saw in Castlebar.

We appear to be drifting off topic.

Ah we won a few harmless underage matches at minor and u-21 against ye since 2001 Cosmo. Obviously you and your rabbit friend dont attend the underage matches.

[ross matt]

Keith Higgins has no business togging out the next day.

That was an awful cheap shot today.

Yeah I'd say Keith will fess up and exempt himself from the final against us.
Cheap shot yes. But I've seen them hit harder and so have you.
I recall a certain Dublin midfielder slamming a meath opponent in the jaw alot harder than Higgins hit the Galway lad today. He togged out the next day though. You threw the head yourself when the likes of myself and others brought it to your attention. Bit rich of looking down your nose at a Connacht footballer today for doing alot less than what you defended on the part of one of your own.

[Blowitupref]

Was a poor game today but Mayo showed their worth (apart from frees) by running out easy winners & they made Galway look ordinary by winning every key battle all over the field. Mayo will Connacht no doubt in my mind Rossies are a few years from Mayo's level yet.

Reading the report on RTE it said Attendance: 19,375 didn't look anything like that on TV?

[GalwayBayBoy]

Well just back from Castlebar and that was one bad game of football. Mayo were bad and we were even badder. At least in the first half we played a semblance of football at times but the second half was brutal stuff altogether. To go in 4 points up at the break was barely about par as we had a strong enough breeze behind us but to only score 0-1 after that was cat even allowing for a stiffening wind against us.

Problems for Galway were the half-back line and midfield mainly which is the engine of the team and if these areas are performing poorly you have no chance. Gary Sice is a good player but had an awful game today. Greg Higgins is not a centre-back and Gary O'Donnell is just average sadly. Joe Bergin tried and got on a lot of ball but either kept slipping or kept fumbling or kicking the ball to the opposition. Finian Hanley I can barely remember touching the ball and is another who is out of position as he's just not a midfielder. Hardly anyone from either team caught a clean ball all day but Mayo definitely seemed to win more of the breaks around the middle. The full-back line actually did fairly well I thought considering there were two U-21's in it.

Up front I think it's fair to say Meehan, Nicky Joyce and Armstrong were badly missed. I'm including Meehan as he's patently nowhere near match fit or match sharp and how could he be after the best part of 18 months out. The game looked like it had come about a month too early for him. PJ tried and looked dangerous intermittently. Bane had a decent first half but faded badly as he sometimes does. Conroy again another out of position player because he is definitely not a full-forward. Mark Hehir had some nice touches in the first half overall the game passed him by a little but he'll improve. Bradshaw another playing at wing-forward when he's more suited to wing-back although with the lads not available maybe they felt they had to move him up front.

Turning point of the game possibly was when Concannon scored our only point of the second half. He definitely should have buried that chance in the net but didn't. Mayo then scored their goal about 3 minutes later so that was a 5 point swing in a few minutes. The remainder of the game played out with Galway players in their own half and around midfield kicking Galway free-kicks straight to Mayo lads standing 6 or 7 yards away from them and then watching them kick the ball over the bar. 4 or 5 points must have been gifted in such fashion. It was almost comical.

Certainly too I think the Galway management have to look at their own performance. By my reckoning there were possibly up to 5 or 6 Galway players playing out of position today. You can't have that many lads playing away from their best position and expect them to give a coherent team performance. And then when subs were made in the second half a forward was taken off for a defender and a defender was taken off and replaced by a forward. Head scratching stuff really.

Anyway having drawn Meath it looks like it's be two games and out for us this year.

I think the temptation would be to blow the thing apart and rebuild it from the bottom up. Appoint someone like Alan Mulholland and leave him at it for 3 or 4 years to bring though some of the younger player. At least at underage we seem to be getting our act together and producing talented players again but if you do that you have to be prepared to let them lose games as well until they learn how to win them. 

[highorlow]

Christ thats a poor Galway team. Mayo by 5 or 6. Could be even more painful than that for Galway and we could open the floodgates altogether and win by 10 to 15.

My prediction last week was right. The 2 O'Shea's should be very proud of their performances today and Ronan Mac played well also when he came on.

Our backs were very good also.

The conditions didn't suit some of our forwards but we never looked in danger of loosing this game as we dominated all over the field.

Hopefully we will have the momentum and mindset now to go to Hyde and beat what will be an organized and very physical Roscommon side. I think we have the better forwards to win it.

The first half was dominated by both back lines and this added to the poor conditions made for poor viewing. We upped our game in the 2nd half and that 2nd half was as good as any match played so far this year.

[mckieran]

Conroy again another out of position player because he is definitely not a full-forward.

He does not appear to be a midfielder either; I wonder where would suit him....

[IolarCoisCuain]

Excellent analysis from Ross Matt and Galway Bay Boy. It'll be a good Connacht Final. GBB, I hope you wire it up to Meath. Galway have big problems but I assure you, Meath aren't too hot themselves.

[Blowitupref]

Hopefully we will have the momentum and mindset now to go to Hyde and beat what will be an organized and very physical Roscommon side. I think we have the better forwards to win it.

You have got the momentum going into the Connacht final. Roscommon will be organized however they are not physical all their backs are small & light i wouldn't even class the taller guys Finneran,Shine etc as physical.

[AZOffaly]

Janey that was woeful. I know conditions were bad, but all those lads are native Irish I think?

It's a long time since I saw such bad handling, passing, shooting and thinking. The carelessness would drive you scatty watching it.

I think that was a poor day for a great rivalry.

[Groucho]

The worst game I have seen in 30 years

[ross4life]

The worst game I have seen in 30 years

1993 Connacht final is still the worst game i have seen.

[An Fhairche Abu]

Mayo fully deserved the win today, better in every respect on the pitch. The free taking situation will come back to haunt them before the year is out though, maybe even in the next game.

Conditions were terrible in Castlebar which made it hard for both teams but even accounting for this the standard of fare was atrocious, the 1st half was the worst I think I've ever seen between Galway and Mayo. Galway were poxed to be leading at H-T, mostly through the inability of Mayo to kick scores in the 1st half. When Mayo then showed the slightest bit of fight in the 2nd half however, Galway didn't want to know - to only score 1 point in a half of football is pathetic.
Duane and Forde did well for debutants (although Forde was caught out for the Mayo goal), Faherty couldn't be faulted in goal, he had one great save in the 2nd half and a few decent stops, Bane at least looked like he would kick a score if the ball went into him, Bradshaw tried hard and Blake did well initially when introduced. Hanley was anonymous at midfield, Hehir got a fair idea of the difficult leap to senior inter county today and the rest weren't at the races at all either.

Having just seen the Higgins incident on the Sunday Game, it was a disgraceful, cowardly punch which should have been a definite red but IMHO it had no material difference on the result in the end, I believe Mayo would have won anyway.
Meath will be absolutely delighted with a home draw against us, I cannot for the life of me see what can be done in 2 weeks to sort anything out to even make it competitive  - the players just aren't there right now. This is the worst state Galway senior football has been in a long, long time and who knows when we'll rise out of it again.

[western exile]

Also, posters are over critical of that Galway team which I feel is better than most are saying.

I totally and unreservedly take back that comment from this morning 

[muppet]

Hell I'm getting frustrated writing this, if I were a Mayo man living in Mayo I'd be kicking up holy war.

You are not a Mayoman. Please don't lecture us on how to be one.

I reserve the right to navigate myself onto my own rocks without some hoor lecturing me that I'm doing it wrong.

Seriously though it is depressing to read how many Mayo supporters join in the gratuitous bashing of our players, past and present, by some wind up merchant. How do we expect the players to have a back-bone when there are so many of their so called supporters who don't have one?

However win on Sunday and all will be the complete opposite again, way too much of the opposite.

Back to the team. I hope Trevor switches with McLoughlin and Ronan is fit enough to play some part if needed. But we should still win.

Some of our supporters should have a look at themselves.

Well done Mayo, you can only beat what is in front of you. When that is Galway you will take the win no matter how the game goes.

I will be on my knees in two weeks praying that Galway beat Meath and it can happen. Galway's problems seem to be as much on the side-line as on the pitch. Blake CHF? Bradshaw LHF?? Hanley MF??? Put these guys in their best positions, which were all problem areas, and things would improve quickly.

Not going to analyse as Ross Matt (and others) gave a good neutral's perspective, but Ros will still be the reddest of hot favourites the next day. 

[galwayman]

Well what can you say about that from a Galway perspective? Utterly depressing stuff in the 2nd half particularly.To be outscored by 1-8 to a single point in the 2nd half of a championship game is inexcusable.
Mayo were no great shakes themselves but were deserving winners.
Higgins should have been shown a straight red and will probably get a ban based on video evidence. I think Mayo would have won regardless because we were so poor.

It's hard to know where we go from here. We have very little chance against Meath away in 2 weeks time and we could take a hammering in that game. O Flatharta will not get a second term.
We were a total shambles today.We were all over the place. Some really strange decisions made on the sideline - in fairness Hanley is not a midfielder, Bradshaw is not a forward and Blake most definitely is not a forward yet they were all played in those positions.

Time for radical surgery for the Meath game