Kerry v Mayo NFL D1; Round 1

[moysider]

Agreed that Hennelly should have varied his kickouts away from Walsh but I don't think H&C could have moved any sooner - Walsh caught two, maybe three balls before AOS was on

I know; but 3 balls lost on own kick-out like that could be too many in a close championship match. Forgetting about H&C for a minute, our captain is right beside our goalie and they need to be able to manage that scenario on the field. The way the game has gone a kick out is possession of the ball. We just gave it back to them because of their advantage with Moran and Walsh. One of our strengths is the ability of Keegan, Higgins, Durcan, Vaughan, Coen,  Boyle, Barrett to work ball out from the back.

[Chimley]

Didn't get to go after all so I'm relying on TG4 for what I saw yesterday but a few points that I noticed (some have been mentioned already):

Positives:
* Good start for management and this will only act as a positive. Important to get a good start as doubts can creep in when results are not going your way.
* New players. Durcan and Coen played the full game. DOC got a great point that will have given him a bit of confidence too. Ronaldson showed well and won his own ball.
* Doherty is growing into a proper tank. My MOM yesterday.
*Looked very solid in defence and unlike last year there were no gaping holes.
* More of an edge physically. I was looking on in disbelief in Limerick when three Kerry lads had surrounded Cillian early in the game and he was left to fend them off himself while other lads just looked on. Yesterday, it was noticeable that we had numbers quickly at any flashpoint.

Negatives:

*Midfield. We were cleaned out by Moran and Walsh when he came on. Every bit as bad as Limerick. Moran won every hop ball so easily that it was like a free to Kerry.
* A slight gloss on the performance by the timing of the goals. Until Freeman found the net, we were second best and Kerry were building momentum when we got the second. Both were slightly out of the blue so the game could have been very different if these had not gone in.
* Regans injury. It looks like he was being pencilled in for serious consideration this year and he lasted only 8 minutes. Even if he recovers in time for championship, he'll have missed invaluable experience.
* FB line: Even though KK picked up MOM on TG4, I thought we had a few narrow escapes and Kerry got hands on the ball close to goal a few times that the likes of Donaghy or Gooch would have punished. To be fair though, they never threatened Hennellys goal and we seemed to crowd them out very well.

[Mayo4Sam]

On the Evan Regan thing, I've heard it from more than one person from both Knockmore and Ballina football circles, him breaking his collar bone neither confirms nor refutes his attitude or lack of, Moysider you're as blinkered about Regan as Suferus is about Roscommon, it's on that scale.
I hope he turns out to be the next cillian o'c, I'd be delighted. Hopefully it's a speedy recovery and we get to see what he's really like.

Though Higgins was MOM yesterday, excellent. Happy with most of the players, esp Coen, very solid display. Ronaldson won a lot of ball, Conroy won a fraction of the amount, conroy ended up with 4 points, which would you choose there?? Tough call

Durcan didn't do anything that would suggest he'll be near out HB line and Adam Gallagher was very poor.

The kick passing was new, some of it good, some terrible. A lot of high aimless ball put into our FF line, why? They're not huge men

Thought we looked more defensive as well, I noticed we dropped a bit deeper without the ball, right back to inside the 45 ala Donegal and seemed to be more protection for our FB line which has been an issue for a while, Caff being isolated one-on-one. A positive move IMO

Overall, great to get the win even if it was a sloppy game at times but we got the goals at times when Kerry were on top and killed their momentum

[rosnarun]

The main point i took from the game is AOS is mayos best Midfielder and best player and Midfield is his bese position .Any experiment with him playing in other positions should stop now.
Very impressed with Durcan yesterday in fact the only time he coughed up the ball was while i was explaining all around me about how well he was playing.

BTW
Where richie Feeney?

[muppet]

The main point i took from the game is AOS is mayos best Midfielder and best player and Midfield is his bese position .Any experiment with him playing in other positions should stop now.
Very impressed with Durcan yesterday in fact the only time he coughed up the ball was while i was explaining all around me about how well he was playing.

BTW
Where richie Feeney?

Yea I thought he went very well for his debut in a serious game. He had a quiet period after half time but got involved in some hard running setting up some attacks towards the end, which is a good sign on a February pitch.

I also agree about AOS.

[AZOffaly]

Kerry slipped up badly here. Should have played it in Limerick.

[muppet]

Kerry slipped up badly here. Should have played it in Limerick.

There is a home and away agreement.

They play us at home in Tralee and they play us away in the Gaelic Grounds.

If we have to play at a neutral ground it is in Killarney.

[twohands!!!]

It was way too slow! And not just management to blame. At this stage an experienced keeper and the likes of Keith, Keegan and other should be able to manage the game better on the field as well. We completely handed momentum back to Kerry by kicking long to their giants. The most worrying aspect of the game for us. That is a most basic aspect of housekeeping at any level. It s not even tactical as such. It s Mickey Mouse stuff. But us being us we could easily do the same shit again in a championship match. I suspect this is one of the issues twohands was on about earlier? If he has many more issues were fucked altogether 

Yeah the thing I'd be more concerned about from a Mayo point of view was how they once again let a team back into it. I said at half-time that I expected Walsh to replace Sheehan - I thought Sheehan looked miles off the pace and I wonder if he will feature much for Kerry anymore given the likely competition at midfield.

The Mayo management should have been far better prepared for Walsh to come on and for the Kerry to get into the game again. This was always the sort of game where you expected the side behind to come out and have a rattle at the start of the 2nd half and Mayo did little/noting to stop this Kerry period of dominance. It was the 50th minute when Aidan O'Shea came on and he was the 2nd sub the management team made asthey have replaced Gallagher with o'Connor in the 44th minute, so I don't see how anyone can say the management responded quickly - they let Kerry have 15 minutes of dominance and cut the Mayo lead to 3 points. 15 minutes of that kind of dominance in a championship match, especially when it was as the result of an extremely obvious move by Kerry, is seriously off the pace in terms of game management.

The thing is that Hennelly should have made the move to change the kickouts himself- he has to bear a fair amount of responsibility here for constantly going long when he could see Mayo were getting cleaned at midfield. I thought it was very noticeable the lack of pressure the Kerry forwards were putting on the Mayo backs throughout the game so I think Mayo could very easily have mixed in a short or mid-range kick-outs to break up the Kerry momentum.

On broken collar-bones they can take an age to get right - had a cousin do one once and it was never right after - he started dislocating itself after any sort of shoulder and he had to go back and have pins put it and had all sorts of bother - it's definitely not something I'd be rushing back from. Pity as in the few minutes of his cameo Regan looked lively.

[macdanger2]

I wouldn't be as harsh on the management - they gave the lads on the pitch a chance to deal with it, they weren't dealing with it and then they made a change. Granted it was almost 15 minutes but you're only talking about 2-3 balls during that time.

Should they have scrambled to make a change the minute they saw Walsh lining out at MF after HT? Or after he caught one ball?? Not IMO anyway.

They definitely need to work more with Hennelly (and / or the other goalkeepers) on his kickout strategy - Cluxton is the role model for what he needs to do. If Vaughan is playing MF, one of his big advantages is that he should be able to make a 30 yard run across the pitch, burning a bigger, slower midfielder to collect an accurate kickout.

[twohands!!!]

I wouldn't be as harsh on the management - they gave the lads on the pitch a chance to deal with it, they weren't dealing with it and then they made a change. Granted it was almost 15 minutes but you're only talking about 2-3 balls during that time.

Should they have scrambled to make a change the minute they saw Walsh lining out at MF after HT? Or after he caught one ball?? Not IMO anyway.

They definitely need to work more with Hennelly (and / or the other goalkeepers) on his kickout strategy - Cluxton is the role model for what he needs to do. If Vaughan is playing MF, one of his big advantages is that he should be able to make a 30 yard run across the pitch, burning a bigger, slower midfielder to collect an accurate kickout.

I'm probably being a bit harsh - there was lots of positives to take from the game for Mayo but the fact that 1) Hennelly was hoofing down ball on the Kerry midfield and 2) it was 15 minutes before Aidan O'Shea came on - really made it look very much like Mayo failings of old. I was expecting Mayo's sideline nous to improve with the new management and this looked very much like the way Horan would have reacted. It is only 1 game so hard to draw any major conclusions but just struck me as poor that Mayo werent better prepared for Kerry to  come out all guns blazing at the start of the 2nd half.

[Chimley]

Maybe AOS only had 20 minutes in him for some reason.

[macdanger2]

I wouldn't be as harsh on the management - they gave the lads on the pitch a chance to deal with it, they weren't dealing with it and then they made a change. Granted it was almost 15 minutes but you're only talking about 2-3 balls during that time.

Should they have scrambled to make a change the minute they saw Walsh lining out at MF after HT? Or after he caught one ball?? Not IMO anyway.

They definitely need to work more with Hennelly (and / or the other goalkeepers) on his kickout strategy - Cluxton is the role model for what he needs to do. If Vaughan is playing MF, one of his big advantages is that he should be able to make a 30 yard run across the pitch, burning a bigger, slower midfielder to collect an accurate kickout.

I'm probably being a bit harsh - there was lots of positives to take from the game for Mayo but the fact that 1) Hennelly was hoofing down ball on the Kerry midfield and 2) it was 15 minutes before Aidan O'Shea came on - really made it look very much like Mayo failings of old. I was expecting Mayo's sideline nous to improve with the new management and this looked very much like the way Horan would have reacted. It is only 1 game so hard to draw any major conclusions but just struck me as poor that Mayo werent better prepared for Kerry to  come out all guns blazing at the start of the 2nd half.

Even leaving in-game management aside, you'd expect to see an improvement in Hennellys awareness of kickouts when things start to go wrong. Probably one of the downsides of normally dominating MF is that he doesn't usually have to think about these things.

[Syferus]

Mayo lost the middle in 3/5 championahip games last year, only succeeding in beating Galway's inexperienced duo and a continually malfunctioning Cork midfield. For all of the talent Mayo have in the middle their performances have been sub-par recently and the limitations of players like AOS (defending, he turns like a tank) are well known now. I suppose having a line of HBs with hard-ons for attacking (and indeed they are great at it) doesn't help the big brutes in the middle much either, for breaks or for support when it goes wrong.

[Farrandeelin]

I hope yesterday puts an end to the AOS in ff position talk anyway. It still is a problem position as -goal aside - Freeman was poor. McLoughlin was poor too until he got his goal too I thought. And yes, Hennelly should know better, surely to God after last year they should have learned about Kerry's midfield.

Was impressed with our defence yesterday. Coen clearly not a corner back though. Apart from the kickouts Hennelly did well. Keane had a very good game. Was my motm as I left the ground even. Caff will have to earn the place back. Up front Conroy was the pick of the forwards. Doc was very impressive too in winning dirty ball. Ronaldson did well too despite not scoring. SOS needs to sort out his footpassing. He isn't able to be the 'main man' in midfield either I'm afraid.

Nice to have 2 points on the board though.

[larryin89]

Too much examination here lads/ lassies for February.

I do agree with the sentiment though that the players who are now very seasoned campaigners should not have to be told by the sideline to stop hoofing it up garyowen style down the middle when we are not able to outfield someone like Moran, albeit he should be surrounded on landing anyway to nullify the advantage , no sense in jumping with a man if you can't disrupt enough to stop him making the clean catch way better off watching and pouncing when he lands.