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Why? With the attendances to date in this round robin anything that can hold over 10k should be in play, you'd get 11,500 in Mullingar, a likely sell out and a venue that's equidistant between the counties. 
Breffni is far more advantageous for Armagh, I wouldn't dream of proposing the Hyde as it would be so unfair on Armagh but why should Galway have to take their medicine on pitch location?

I'm not objecting to Mullingar, who exactly is?

You just said it was too small?!

Why? With the attendances to date in this round robin anything that can hold over 10k should be in play, you'd get 11,500 in Mullingar, a likely sell out and a venue that's equidistant between the counties. 
Breffni is far more advantageous for Armagh, I wouldn't dream of proposing the Hyde as it would be so unfair on Armagh but why should Galway have to take their medicine on pitch location?

[the team is just a bit disjointed at present]

Strange to say we had 3 or 4 top class performances and yet it was a poor display overall. Shows that others were well off the pace, and as a whole, the team is just a bit disjointed at present.

Sending off made a difference, but we were getting on top at that point and would've won regardless. That still doesn't change the fact that Westmeath were probably better for the first 45 mins. For all the talk about our 'control', we still keep kicking ball away.

Cooke and McGrath were immense. Comer and Maher made a savage difference once they came on. Kelly had a good first half and Hernon shook off a shaky first half to get two good scores. Not sure anyone else can be satisfied with their performance.

Hard to know where we are. Keep winning games but bar the odd good half here and there (Monaghan second half, Roscommon first half, Kerry game), I'm not sure we've put in a very good performance all season. You can take positives or negatives from it though, depending on your outlook

Important to note the 5 missed goal chances though (and zero for Westmeath). Had 1 or 2 of those gone in, I suppose the narrative would be different. Not the first time this season we've been incredibly wasteful

Very much agree with both of those observations, Galway continue to win while playing only middling at best. Westmeath looked like the team that had been in last year's All Ireland up until about 45 minutes in, the sending off was a killer for them and Galway had a big impact off the bench from Comer and Maher. The goal chance to goal conversion rate was poor again.
At no stage have Galway had everyone on the same page this year. Without Comer our attack is badly without a focal point, Walsh is way off form. Some sloppy play at times although have to credit Westmeath for this also, made Galway look bad.

Cooke was excellent even without the late scoring burst, clear MOTM. He's improved as the year has progressed, hopefully that will continue in the right direction. McGrath played well again, he a little terror out there, no fear of playing in front, his height disadvantage hasn't been exploited yet. Sweeney was good again, showing consistently every game at the minute, a player who has kicked on at IC level clearly from last year. Hernon had his best day in a Senior jersey, impressive in spurts but still ran into trouble a few times and is still finding his feet a bit. Athletically and in terms of the football in him, he clearly has a lot to offer though. I thought Loughlin gave Glynn the run around a few times, he stood out as a really good player for Westmeath.

Maher should be starting from here on out, made a power of difference in terms of line breaking when he came on and he puts himself about tackling anything that comes in his vicinity, unlucky with the goal chance as he did the right thing, just a good save, a really nice point as well. He had a bit of a down performance against Tyrone but he was missed the middle, not near the footballer Conroy is but you have to have a few hod carriers out there that are going to just get stuck in as well. A bit of a worry that Conroy's legs will be found out at as the pitches are now firmed up and playing faster, he was less of a force than springtime in the 2022 final and semi-final when the needs were most, is another year older at this stage. He still looks a rolls royce on wet, slower playing days like the Tyrone match in Salthill but on Saturday, until there was the combination of the sending off and the arrival of Maher, Cooke was fighting a bit of a lone battle getting through the work required around the pitch in the middle area. Don't want to be overly harsh as I could not speak highly enough of Conroy and what he's given to Galway football but no point in not flagging that there's a risk unless there's sufficient other lads out there to do that work for him.

Burke was poor, Culhane was even worse, there's a spot there for the taking with Finnerty's injury problems or at least to be the first forward sub in and Culhane didn't stick the hand up, Burke at least has shown well in other games. Talk of the Galway forward depth is oversold, with Finnerty injured all the time this year it's showing up that we're not as well stocked there as is made out, Burke is not going to score heavily. Galway scoring returns have been modest but enough to get the job done as not conceding much at the other end. The Mayo league final non performance up front is still bugging me however, if there's any repeat of that in any match left we'll be gone.

Shane Walsh was clearly hobbled in the 2nd half, ridiculous to have left him on as long. He has been either injured worse than let on or he is simply way out of form. Unless he gets back to near top form there's no chance Galway will get to where they want to go. Comer came on and was superb, if he had got the lobbed effort into the goal you'd nearly have had to give him MOTM for a 20 minute cameo.

Mattie Tierney gets through a mountain of work, but Galway really need him to step up and be a 3 points (at least) from play man consistently, he was well out of the game Saturday. For all the "squad improvement" if Comer and Walsh (and at the minute it's more a question of whether Walsh will have any impact) are well held, we are in serious bother. If Galway stick a couple of those goal chances, then maybe the narrative changes but we are just not clinical enough in front of the goal, it was like a repeat of the league final in terms of profligacy. Galway have a lot of improving to do really.

Must be stated that Westmeath were really good and it's so unfortunate they have nothing to show from the first two matches, should have got something against Armagh and the 8 point margin flattered Galway to an unbelievable extent. Been a good while since I was in Mullingar for a match, but it remains a fine venue with great local fans.

Seems to be flying around that Mayo v cork is in tullamore along with dubs v Sligo . Galway v Armagh in croker with Derry match I think . Doing everything they can to give Galway an advantage in a year where they are expected to win it out anyway by many pundits .

Match will be on in Breffni Park, hopefully your seemingly constant talk about Galway's apparent march to Sam isn't as inaccurate as the rest of your predictions.
Wouldn't be happy with Breffni as a venue, a joke for Galway really given the travel distance compared to the opposition. Anywhere in South Armagh about an hour away, it's two hours from Tuam and as for travelling from West Galway forget it. I don't want to hear about the size of the Galway support base and how many might travel either way, this is an advantage that shouldn't be given in terms of venue access to Armagh.

Jesus I hate to say it but that panel is off the charts with talent , won't be beat this year . I have them backed before I'm accused of form of yerra . Got them @ 13/2 a couple of weeks back .the winnings will help soften the blow

Yeah tis like looking at a Dublin 6 in a row match day panel in their pomp alright.

Stop the lights Larry, you are some ticket.

Hernon in as Dylan McHugh out with injury. Sticking with McDaid at 7, I know plenty aren't a fan of it but I can see the logic.
Cathal Sweeney very unlucky not to start but is performing really well off the bench. Not sure about dropping Maher out of the 15 although Conroy and Cooke were two of the top performers last time out in fairness.
Nice to see Mulkerrin return to the squad, has been a long road back for him.

Hopefully a good performance Saturday, weather conditions won't be a problem this weekend.

Galway are the only team in the Sam Maguire to win all championship matches so far.

Long may that streak continue!
Have only played 3 matches to be fair though.

If Kerry can get back to their best then that's a decent shout as it would take a really strange set of permutations for Mayo and Kerry to have to play each other again before the AI final.

Is the semi final draw made?

Entirely open draw this year while looking to avoid repeat match ups is my understanding, the predetermined provincial pairings of Ulster/Connacht and Munster/Leinster like last year are gone.
So let's say you had Roscommon, Mayo, Dublin and Kerry in the semi finals this year, only possible combo for the semi finals are Kerry-Ros and Mayo-Dublin as Mayo have already played Roscommon and Kerry and Dublin have played Roscommon already as well, there's no need for a draw.
Swap Galway out for Rossies in that scenario and it would be a draw with Kerry-Mayo the only fixture that couldn't happen.
Derry, Dublin, Mayo and Galway would be open draw with any pairing valid.

Again that's my understanding, have seen contradictory information as well but that was from a GAA clarification given to the Irish Examiner.

If Kerry can get back to their best then that's a decent shout as it would take a really strange set of permutations for Mayo and Kerry to have to play each other again before the AI final.

Westmeath were very unfortunate to not get at least a point on Saturday, can they bring the same level of performance on their home patch this weekend to try and stifle Galway? We are well warned either way, need to go at this in a professional manner and ideally get any notion of a shock out of the way as early as possible, might be difficult to achieve though, Galway are erring much more on the keep it tight and try to grind out results at the moment.
Last championship match up was 2006 and what a dark day that was at the time. Westmeath were a decent team then in fairness, and as the years went on it turned out to be far from the worst day for the footballers.

Only Galway and Armagh managed to get a win out of all the provincial finalists in the first round of matches, given that all had home advantage (Louth situation obviously a wrinkle there) that is really surprising.

Apologies to Dublin GAA, Central GAA and all the Dublin fans for daring to play the first half on our terms, for leading at half time, for coming back to draw the game, for refusing to know our places and upsetting ye're normal day out by not rolling over and letting ye win.

WE ARE ROS💛💙

Roscommon should make zero apologies for how they played and how they setup, hilarious that the Dubs are affronted to the point of booing a seemingly endless phase of possession, they invented this style.

[In my eyes it's only when you really beat one of the top 3 or 4 teams from the year before that you be truly considered an AI contender]

I was looking back over the last 20 years at what teams were making the AI semifinals the most and have listed below, the last 10 years semi finalists. No surprise with the top 3 anyway although amazing Tipp have made more semis than any other Ulster team bar Tyrone. Interestingly back in the 00's you had Cork and Meath up there too.

Obviously for years we are used to Kerry and Dublin being the two main favourites to make it into the semis or the final but Mayo in the last 10 years have joined them with Galway nowhere to be seen for years until recently.
The Ulster champions have a tendency to put in great performances in Ulster and provide good early form but then often disappoint in Croker. Donegal and Monaghan have been doing this for years although Derry reached their first semi last year since 2004, although they did easily hammer Clare.

Galway lost to the Super Dubs in 2018 whilst Monaghan made their first semifinal since the All Ireland series started but still struggle to win in HQ.

In my eyes it's only when you really beat one of the top 3 or 4 teams from the year before that you be truly considered an AI contender. Tyrone hadn't beaten Kerry, Dublin or Mayo from 2008 until 2021 although they did get to a few semis.

I'm a little surprised how many people are talking up this Galway team who got to the final last year but hadn't beaten any of so called big guns on the way. They beat the Rossies in the Connacht final and then struggled to beat Armagh. They did beat Derry quite well in the end in a very defensive match with both teams seemingly at similar levels during the league.

Galway put up a good performance in the final but in my eyes they are being slightly over stated as one of this years strong favourites just on last years showing. I suppose they have improved a bit during the league and with Walsh and Comer in their team they are always in with a good shout. In my eyes Walsh didn't really stand out all year except in the final whilst Comer was the opposite.
I'm sure Mayo are loving such talk and would relish meeting them later in the year.

Team       Semifinal appearances in last 10 years
Dublin   10
Kerry     8
Mayo      8
Tyrone   6
Galway   2
Tipp       2
Donegal  1
Derry      1
Monaghan1
Cavan      1

Don't necessarily disagree with the overall thesis that Galway are being overrated at the minute and have a lot to prove, but is the win over Mayo in Connacht first round last year worth nothing given they were in the final the previous year? Are we back to wins bring irrelevant unless they are at the knockout stage, I know that's what some Mayo fans have said. Or do you mean you have to beat Kerry or Dublin. What would constitute beating a big gun this year? Genuine question by the way, take no offence at anything negative said there about Galway.

Point of order on Galway Derry though, played them twice and dismantled them both times.

Pressure is on Galway , lots of write ups over the last few weeks about them , the latest being Peter canavan saying if they met Mayo in a final they'd beat them . All or nothing now for Padraigeen and his band of fancy dans .

Because of a few articles?! 
That won't make a blind bit of difference compared to the internal motivation to win for themselves after the disappointment of last year. There was a load of write ups about how Mayo had the job done once they had slain the Dublin dragon and it was "only" Tyrone between them and the holy grail. They still failed to win, were absolutely devastated afterwards but it hasn't stopped them coming back as one of the top contenders this year. Rather than "All or nothing now" for this year, we need to ensure that Galway get back to semi-final and final level much more regularly than has been managed over the last twenty years, the lack of experience of a AI final meant that, unfortunately, the match simply passed a good number of players by.

Getting into whinge territory now, only reason Tyrone lost was the ref.

Cue the gaslight brigade.  Galway were just about worthy winners and even without the red card, I think they would have got over the line. But we have to call out poor decisions and lazy reporting.

I would have the red card as a major factor, the main reason Tyrone lost was that crazy "tackle". Galway were not going well Saturday and were distinctly unimpressive in general. Had Tyrone kept 15 on the pitch they could have easily got at least a draw if not better from the game.
You can take a running jump with your "gaslight brigade" drivel though, I don't appreciate any of the connotations, wherever you are trying to go with it.

I have been on this platform for over 20 years and whilst I respect differing views, reading some of the stuff over the last few pages the tenor of the posts was distantly veering into "Gough rode us sideways and gave the opposition everything" side of things. I've no issue with complaints about the referee (and certainly not Gough) but the tone of the posts was the Gough was brutal hard on Tyrone to the point where it decided the game or that past dealings with Gough meant that Tyrone were at some disadvantage that Galway didn't have to deal with. There is no debate on the red. The black for Morgan is one thing and was harsh undoubtedly in light of what goes on in every match, but trying to bring some form of a false equivalence with Ian Burke's tackle to the Burns red, or to the couple of first half incidents while Galway were on the attack that were hardly frees at all, not to mind allegedly black cards, is laughable. Some of the pointed Tyrone 2nd half frees, which as Manning18 has rightly pointed out, were frees that were soft as f**k. The Daly one in particular was a joke of the highest order. The clearest black card offence of the day happened to Tierney directly in front of Gough and he did nothing.

You can complain about Gough all ye want but when someone calls out what sounds like whinging as whinging, don't be coming with out with this "gaslight" bullshit.

If we are talking about protecting players is that tackle of Burke's not a borderline red too? The tv cameras were far away but at game it was a dangerous heavy tackle around the neck. I thought something was brought out a few years ago to try and cut these type of challenges out.

No I didn't think it was a red at the time, watched it back there would have thought a yellow card was sufficient. Would have been a really harsh red if given and I wonder would it have been shouted for so vociferously if both sides were still at 15 each? It's nowhere near equivalent to the Burns red in any case.

https://twitter.com/MatadorIrish/status/1660573514150100993?s=20
This nonsense on Twitter seems to be the vibe from Tyrone "die hards" by the looks of it, I thought Tyrone were better than the likes of this but clearly I was wrong. You'd swear this was a Cormac Reilly 2014-esque ref performance or something. Maybe better to blame the ref for all current ills rather than wonder why a result, even with numerical disadvantage, couldn't be got against opposition that really underperformed and played one of their worst games so far this year.

I'm referring to "only reason Tyrone lost was the ref." comment. Nobody said that or implied it.  I truly believe that Galway would have won this 15 on 15. But, rightfully or wrongfully to me Gough did us no favours there with a good few other decisions. You seem to be counterwhinging the perceived whinge.

Counterwhinging, gaslighting. Anymore word nonsense you want to bring to the party?

Getting into whinge territory now, only reason Tyrone lost was the ref.

Cue the gaslight brigade.  Galway were just about worthy winners and even without the red card, I think they would have got over the line. But we have to call out poor decisions and lazy reporting.

I would have the red card as a major factor, the main reason Tyrone lost was that crazy "tackle". Galway were not going well Saturday and were distinctly unimpressive in general. Had Tyrone kept 15 on the pitch they could have easily got at least a draw if not better from the game.
You can take a running jump with your "gaslight brigade" drivel though, I don't appreciate any of the connotations, wherever you are trying to go with it.

I have been on this platform for over 20 years and whilst I respect differing views, reading some of the stuff over the last few pages the tenor of the posts was distantly veering into "Gough rode us sideways and gave the opposition everything" side of things. I've no issue with complaints about the referee (and certainly not Gough) but the tone of the posts was the Gough was brutal hard on Tyrone to the point where it decided the game or that past dealings with Gough meant that Tyrone were at some disadvantage that Galway didn't have to deal with. There is no debate on the red. The black for Morgan is one thing and was harsh undoubtedly in light of what goes on in every match, but trying to bring some form of a false equivalence with Ian Burke's tackle to the Burns red, or to the couple of first half incidents while Galway were on the attack that were hardly frees at all, not to mind allegedly black cards, is laughable. Some of the pointed Tyrone 2nd half frees, which as Manning18 has rightly pointed out, were frees that were soft as f**k. The Daly one in particular was a joke of the highest order. The clearest black card offence of the day happened to Tierney directly in front of Gough and he did nothing.

You can complain about Gough all ye want but when someone calls out what sounds like whinging as whinging, don't be coming with out with this "gaslight" bullshit.

If we are talking about protecting players is that tackle of Burke's not a borderline red too? The tv cameras were far away but at game it was a dangerous heavy tackle around the neck. I thought something was brought out a few years ago to try and cut these type of challenges out.

No I didn't think it was a red at the time, watched it back there would have thought a yellow card was sufficient. Would have been a really harsh red if given and I wonder would it have been shouted for so vociferously if both sides were still at 15 each? It's nowhere near equivalent to the Burns red in any case.

https://twitter.com/MatadorIrish/status/1660573514150100993?s=20
This nonsense on Twitter seems to be the vibe from Tyrone "die hards" by the looks of it, I thought Tyrone were better than the likes of this but clearly I was wrong. You'd swear this was a Cormac Reilly 2014-esque ref performance or something. Maybe better to blame the ref for all current ills rather than wonder why a result, even with numerical disadvantage, couldn't be got against opposition that really underperformed and played one of their worst games so far this year.

Getting into whinge territory now, only reason Tyrone lost was the ref.

Cue the gaslight brigade.  Galway were just about worthy winners and even without the red card, I think they would have got over the line. But we have to call out poor decisions and lazy reporting.

I would have the red card as a major factor, the main reason Tyrone lost was that crazy "tackle". Galway were not going well Saturday and were distinctly unimpressive in general. Had Tyrone kept 15 on the pitch they could have easily got at least a draw if not better from the game.
You can take a running jump with your "gaslight brigade" drivel though, I don't appreciate any of the connotations, wherever you are trying to go with it.

I have been on this platform for over 20 years and whilst I respect differing views, reading some of the stuff over the last few pages the tenor of the posts was distantly veering into "Gough rode us sideways and gave the opposition everything" side of things. I've no issue with complaints about the referee (and certainly not Gough) but the tone of the posts was the Gough was brutal hard on Tyrone to the point where it decided the game or that past dealings with Gough meant that Tyrone were at some disadvantage that Galway didn't have to deal with. There is no debate on the red. The black for Morgan is one thing and was harsh undoubtedly in light of what goes on in every match, but trying to bring some form of a false equivalence with Ian Burke's tackle to the Burns red, or to the couple of first half incidents while Galway were on the attack that were hardly frees at all, not to mind allegedly black cards, is laughable. Some of the pointed Tyrone 2nd half frees, which as Manning18 has rightly pointed out, were frees that were soft as f**k. The Daly one in particular was a joke of the highest order. The clearest black card offence of the day happened to Tierney directly in front of Gough and he did nothing.

You can complain about Gough all ye want but when someone calls out what sounds like whinging as whinging, don't be coming with out with this "gaslight" bullshit.