Mayo v Monaghan/Tyrone/Down or Kildare Qualifer Round 3 Thread

[OirthearMhaigheo]

moysider, you say some are treating him like a sacred cow, I say alot of people have their own hidden (and blatant) agenda against him. Maybe I'm giving Johnno the benefit of the doubt so there is some balance to this debate.
As I've said before wait until the season is over to carry out full post mortems, if we don't row in behind the team it will indeed be a very short summer which the doubters and naysayers will have contributed to. I just don't get why we have to be so negative when we still have a fighting chance. Time will tell if that was an average/decent/strong Galway team we lost narrowly to, time will tell if we can challenge for the major honour this year, time will tell if Kerry are still a league ahead of everyone else despite their loss. I just think it's time we stopped getting manically depressed when we lose and over the top c**k a hoop when we win.

[Lar Naparka]

one post on here stated that us Mayo fans while tough on mgt and players are also reasonable.

Well, I said that but I also said that if we exit the championships and go down fighting the fans will be ready and willing to accept that the team did their best. They always are and always come back for more year after year. We have had a lot more dinnertimes than dinners when it comes to being a Mayo fan and yet the belief is always there.
It's a bit subdued at the present but that is perfectly understandable.
Would anyone contend that John O'Mahony appears to be totally in control of the situation and is directing matters with clear purpose and intent?
To say that he doesn't have the players he wants available to him is all very well and may indeed be true.
But is he making the best use of the players he has?
You need to look no further than Fermanagh to find a team with quite limited resources and damn few quality players either. Yet in boxing parlance they are punching well about their weight. Their defence is based on their unique variation of 'puke' football; it's hard going to get scores off them and they keep going with purpose and determination to the very end.
Nobody in the forwards comes within an asses' roar of a Padraig Joyce or a Ciaran McDonald and they will never clock up high scores but I bet very few sides would relish facing them.
Their style of play comes from hours and hours of intensive coaching and they work to a coherent game plan.
Mayo???
I also have no hang-ups about going man to man – if they actually do what is said on their tin! If players continue to stand back from their men, no defensive approach will stop high scores being conceded.
Galway split the Mayo defence with ease to score two goals and in all honesty could have bagged a few more.
Only Kilcoyne seemed to have the confidence to look for goals at the other end.
The faults I mention in both defence and attack are down to lack of coaching; the players honestly gave it all they had but the analogy to sheep in a heap that Babs Keating used once to describe his Offaly hurlers comes to mind.
I certainly don't want to dump O'Mahony now; he has to be given time and he used to have a fine track record but does he really have a clue about what he's up to?
Can he recover his once legendary sure touch?  There is no evidence to suggest that he can.
The talent is there to go at least another round or two but will it be deployed effectively? I honestly wish, as I imagine all Mayo supporters do, that O'Mahony comes out fighting for the next round and shows vision and purpose in directing his charges.
I really would love to be proved wrong and to be able attribute all due credit to The Messiah.
But right now, I am counting down the days, more in hope than anticipation.

[the Deel Rover]

In fairness to moysider i thought that was a good post,  like you said Oirthear Mhaigeo maybe there is a bit of pessimism on this board but all that we are giving is our opinions on the way the past 18 months has gone (and it hasn't been good) . As you said we are still in the championship and in with a fighting chance so hopefully we will give it a lash. o' mahony has  said that the mayo supporters needed to be realistic about or ambitions well from what i see most on the board here are fairly realistic however surely we can be disappointed at not winning the connact title this year mainly IMO because of some dubious management decisions.

[furboot]

I agree to much pessimism and don't know why because the results of the year are no reason to despair.

In the league and championship in 2008 Mayo's biggest loss, this year, was to Derry by a single goal (and they went on to win the league) on the opening day of the league. Since then we have played some of the top teams up and down the country and where we have lost it has just been by the slenderest of margins, including the Connacht final. We all know (inc management i'm sure) that the team isn't perfect and in particular has a defence that leaks too many goals and a fix hasn't been easy to find. But we're not that far away and shouldn't be in any way scared of the others teams still standing. We played Derry, Donegal, Kerry, Kildare, Galway, Tyrone and Laois in the league and I don't recall any emabarrasing defeats - all of those, bar Derry, are still in the championship and all bar Galway are in the qualifiers like ourselves.
We why all the bashing of management and players ?  

[Lar Naparka]

 Moysider, your last post is as good a summing up of our current state of affairs as I have come across anywhere. I had overlooked it when posting my last disjointed ramblings but I’d have to admit now that I was only re-hashing much of what you had already pointed out.
One point you did make and in hindsight it is an obvious one: O’Mahony may have felt there was nothing to be learned from our game against Sligo while Sammon and co. obviously disagreed.
Hindsight is a wonderful weapon; I wonder if the thought ever struck O’Mahony that much can be learned by default, if you know what I mean.
In other words, it’s not what you do but rather what you fail to do that provides information to those shrewd enough to spot it.
I think any reasonable person who has read this last post of yours will understand where the present air of negativity is coming from. The reasons for it are there to be seen.
Togha fir!

[rosnarun]

We why all the bashing of management and players ?   

dont think anyone is bashing the players. sure we all have our prejudices and blind spots my being AOM and Boyle but i know they rey their hearts out but id blame the management for having them in the squad in the first place.
more shit about their not being any one to replace the back line.  heres a short list
James kilcullen
david kilcullen
connor moran
Liam o'malley
steven drake
sean grimes
Dermot Geraghty
Alan  Roche
BJP
colm cafferty
I know some have been tried before some haven't  and there are many junior and intermediate players i may not  aware of but dont give me there is no choice. if some thinf aint broke don't fix it but if it is dont whine that you dont have the right tools

[backofthenet]

i think it all depends on johnno and his team to get the mayos lads mindset right.having done it before with galway must be an advantage. i dont think you can compare the qualifiers last year with this year. last year, under a new management, we couldnt have faced a
more tougher draw then derry away. hopefully this year, with a better team in my opinion, and a reasonable draw, we can progress. im not saying we will win it, but im sure every team left would not relish playing us, and i include kerry in that, the past is the past

[RedandGreenSniper]

We why all the bashing of management and players ?   

dont think anyone is bashing the players. sure we all have our prejudices and blind spots my being AOM and Boyle but i know they rey their hearts out but id blame the management for having them in the squad in the first place.
more shit about their not being any one to replace the back line.  heres a short list
James kilcullen
david kilcullen
connor moran
Liam o'malley
steven drake
sean grimes
Dermot Geraghty
Alan  Roche
BJP
colm cafferty
I know some have been tried before some haven't  and there are many junior and intermediate players i may not  aware of but dont give me there is no choice. if some thinf aint broke don't fix it but if it is dont whine that you dont have the right tools

James kilcullen - was given the opportunity last year and wasn't the answer. Besides discipline is a problem
david kilcullen - discipline also a problem and he opted off both Mayo U-21 and Senior squads earlier this year and is not long back with Ballagh'
connor moran - Conor's a very good wing-back but I wouldn't rely on him in the corner and that's where we need players, not at wing-back
Liam o'malley - Think he's a better option than Colm Boyle in the corner but perhaps he hadn't regained match fitness in time for the Connacht final. Again, though, he's a better half-back
steven drake - Puzzled he hasn't been brought in with exceptional club performances. He was off the mark slightly when he was U-21 but has, imo, improved considerably since then. Like the Barry Regan situation does JOM know something we don't? Hard done by
sean grimes - Has had far too many injury problems over the last few years to get a clear run at it
Dermot Geraghty - I always felt he was a weakness waiting to be targeted by the opposition but I'd have him ahead of at least two of the lads that started against Galway. His club form was good against Kiltane in the championship the last day apparently.
Alan  Roche - Not even open for debate, well past his best.
BJP - I think he would have been perservered with at full-back if he didn't get injured. Also think he should have been recalled there for championship
colm cafferty - Very tenacious player but has just struggled to come up to the mark when playing inter-county.

Just three more names to throw into the hat. Knockmore's Kevin McLoughlin will certainly be in the squad next year, if not starting. This year was probably too soon for him. I've been very impressed by Ballinrobe's Donal Vaughan anytime I've seen him. He's U-21 next year and if he can bulk up just a bit, I think he'll have everything in place.
Breaffy's Kevin Scahill is probably close to 30 but I don't know too many better man markers in the county. He kept Andy Moran scoreless from play in championship last weekend. When was the last time that happened? Possibly three years I'd say.

A lot of very well reasoned posts up here. I wasn't suggesting in my earlier post that JOM is a sacred cow and can't be criticised. I have criticised him in this post and in previous ones. Constructive criticism is important and we all know mistakes were made against Galway and prior to that, indeed. But I just think raising talk about a replacement is ridiculous.
Its a three year term and I think we need continuity in management at this stage in Mayo. Granted there are times when a manager's position becomes untenable but I don't think any sane person could suggest that that is the case in Mayo at present.

[Barney]

Kevin Scahill may have kept Andy scoreless but its hardly an amazing achievement - if he could keep him scoreless and from soloing then he may be worth a look.

dont think anyone is bashing the players. sure we all have our prejudices and blind spots my being AOM and Boyle but i know they rey their hearts out but id blame the management for having them in the squad in the first place.

Management are not entirely to blame. The players work hard and try hard but how hard? How badly do they really want to succeed? Many of them could work harder during matches. The clips shown by O'Cinneide the night of the Connacht Final said it all - the spirit and determination of the Dublin game in 06 should be there every day.

[RedandGreenSniper]

Kevin Scahill may have kept Andy scoreless but its hardly an amazing achievement - if he could keep him scoreless and from soloing then he may be worth a look.

Well it is at club level, believe me. Andy Moran is a savage hard fella to stop scoring at club level. Ballagh play around isolating him when they can and players usually can't cope with that. As I said its probably three years since he didn't score in a game. He usually puts up tallies of about 1-3 so I think it goes down as a serious achievement
Not sure what you mean regarding soloing??

[Tubberman]

I saw this over on mayofans.com who took it from setantasports.com

Not sure what thread to put this in, but it's a strange interview with Pierce Hanley. On one hand you get the impression he's homesick and would love to be back, but on the other hand he's seems pretty determined to make it over there (well, why wouldn't he). The bit about wanting to play with Mayo when he's home in the off-season is bound to cause some debate though! 

http://www.setantasports.com/en/Sport/News...ain-locale/gaa/

Former Mayo underage sensation Pierce Hanley has vowed to make himself a permanent fixture with the Brisbane Lions, despite suffering from acute homesickness in his first few weeks at the AFL giants.

Hanley joined Laois native Colm Begley at the Lions last year and has already been earmarked by officials at the club as a potential star in the making.

However, Hanley is aware that success is not guaranteed in the AFL and admitted that the option to return home is always open to him.

Cork defender Michael Shields recently cut his losses with Carlton and is back training with the Rebels this week.

In the mean time, Hanley is hoping that he will be allowed to come home and play for Mayo in the AFL off-season, a dream he can only realise if John O'Mahony's men make the All-Ireland final on September 21.

"When I got to Brisbane I was homesick but after my parents came out for two weeks at Easter, things got easier," Hanley said in an Evening Herald interview.

"I feel like I'm coping okay now and I want to stay in the AFL to have a long career with the Lions.

"I've got nothing to lose by leaving the GAA. I can always go back if things don't work out so I can't see myself going home for a long time.

"I do miss playing Gaelic football but I can hopefully play for Mayo in the Aussie Rules off-season."

Despite all the projections of doom that have attended the establishment of an AFL scouting networks in Ireland in recent weeks, Hanley has dismissed suggestions that a mass exodus of Gaelic football talent Down Under will take place.

"I can't see dozens and dozens of GAA players coming out here because it's very tough to adapt to Aussie Rules from Gaelic football but nobody should blame anyone who wants to try," he added.

[Lar Naparka]

i think it all depends on johnno and his team to get the mayos lads mindset right.having done it before with galway must be an advantage. i dont think you can compare the qualifiers last year with this year. last year, under a new management, we couldnt have faced a
more tougher draw then derry away. hopefully this year, with a better team in my opinion, and a reasonable draw, we can progress. im not saying we will win it, but im sure every team left would not relish playing us, and i include kerry in that, the past is the past

I'd think this poster makes good points for all reasonable people here. It really does depend on Johnno and his management team to get the mindset right.  The worry is that they are coming up well short in this department.
Throughout the league O'Mahony gave many hostages to fortune, as it were, with the string of positive reports he gave about the team's progress. Just one example was his opinion of Kieran Conroy.
After just one competitive game, he was to say that the player was very impressive and he (Johnno) had the instinctive feeling that he was going to be a natural full back. (I'm paraphrasing the manager here but that is the gist of what he had to say.)
The trouble was that Liam Sammon was watching the same player and had no problem in exploiting his weaknesses.
Young Conroy can't be faulted for lack of effort or commitment but his card was well and truly marked before he went onto the pitch.
With acknowledgement to moysider here for a very astute observation: John O'Mahony said he learned nothing from the Sligo match. Could the same be said about Liam Sammon? Seems he was watching also and he learned plenty.

The big worry is that O'Mahony seems to be losing his touch and I hope he regains it real soon.

[OirthearMhaigheo]

We why all the bashing of management and players ?   

dont think anyone is bashing the players. sure we all have our prejudices and blind spots my being AOM and Boyle but i know they rey their hearts out but id blame the management for having them in the squad in the first place.
more shit about their not being any one to replace the back line.  heres a short list
James kilcullen
david kilcullen
connor moran
Liam o'malley
steven drake
sean grimes
Dermot Geraghty
Alan  Roche
BJP
colm cafferty
I know some have been tried before some haven't  and there are many junior and intermediate players i may not  aware of but dont give me there is no choice. if some thinf aint broke don't fix it but if it is dont whine that you dont have the right tools

James kilcullen - was given the opportunity last year and wasn't the answer. Besides discipline is a problem
david kilcullen - discipline also a problem and he opted off both Mayo U-21 and Senior squads earlier this year and is not long back with Ballagh'
connor moran - Conor's a very good wing-back but I wouldn't rely on him in the corner and that's where we need players, not at wing-back
Liam o'malley - Think he's a better option than Colm Boyle in the corner but perhaps he hadn't regained match fitness in time for the Connacht final. Again, though, he's a better half-back
steven drake - Puzzled he hasn't been brought in with exceptional club performances. He was off the mark slightly when he was U-21 but has, imo, improved considerably since then. Like the Barry Regan situation does JOM know something we don't? Hard done by
sean grimes - Has had far too many injury problems over the last few years to get a clear run at it
Dermot Geraghty - I always felt he was a weakness waiting to be targeted by the opposition but I'd have him ahead of at least two of the lads that started against Galway. His club form was good against Kiltane in the championship the last day apparently.
Alan  Roche - Not even open for debate, well past his best.
BJP - I think he would have been perservered with at full-back if he didn't get injured. Also think he should have been recalled there for championship
colm cafferty - Very tenacious player but has just struggled to come up to the mark when playing inter-county.

Just three more names to throw into the hat. Knockmore's Kevin McLoughlin will certainly be in the squad next year, if not starting. This year was probably too soon for him. I've been very impressed by Ballinrobe's Donal Vaughan anytime I've seen him. He's U-21 next year and if he can bulk up just a bit, I think he'll have everything in place.
Breaffy's Kevin Scahill is probably close to 30 but I don't know too many better man markers in the county. He kept Andy Moran scoreless from play in championship last weekend. When was the last time that happened? Possibly three years I'd say.

A lot of very well reasoned posts up here. I wasn't suggesting in my earlier post that JOM is a sacred cow and can't be criticised. I have criticised him in this post and in previous ones. Constructive criticism is important and we all know mistakes were made against Galway and prior to that, indeed. But I just think raising talk about a replacement is ridiculous.
Its a three year term and I think we need continuity in management at this stage in Mayo. Granted there are times when a manager's position becomes untenable but I don't think any sane person could suggest that that is the case in Mayo at present.

spot on assessments of the players above R&G. I don't really want to go into why Johnno is not picking his fellow clubmen but for all 3 there is a good reason, apart from James K who possibly should have gotten a fairer crack at midfield, he is not a defender though so he just shouldn't be considered at this point for the backs. The other backs on the list have all been tried already and have been found wanting at some stage or other, be it league or c'ship. You can add a few lads from the Connacht final to that growing list. I'd agree that Liam O'Malley while having bad days in the past would still be a better option in the corner than Boyle.
In fairness most of the posts are reasonable and criticism is fine if it is constructive which the majority of posts are. I'm just inclined to look at the glass as being half full when I can and while we're still alive and kicking that's what I'll do. I'd be worried given the current squad where the solutions might come from in the backs, but when the changes were made the last day the goal chances dried up, almost completely, so there is hope we have found the right men for the job.

[Greenabovethered]

I'm astounded about the talk of new managers and changing around the squad. That stuff should be left to the end of the season.  There's a nice blend of youth and experience there at the moment. If the team isn't good enough, so be it. The C McD issue is a non runner, get over it. This snipping in the long grass is nonsense.

It's great to have a competitive team compared to the panels of the eighties and early nineties. Actually there is a young healthy  spine in the team at the moment, Clarke, Higgins, Howley, Parsons, McGarrity, Harte, Dillon. Admittedly we are short a quality full back and full forward.  Sometimes we have to improvise, look at Kerry putting Moynihan at No.3. If Jimmy Nallen is good enough to play wing back, surely he can play full back. He's playing midfield for his club so his fielding ability is not in question.

Is Andy Moran just a blond Brian Moloney. I'm disappointed with his progress so far this year. I thought he would kick on and take over some of the scoring responsibility.

Anyway the biggest problem we have at the moment is a porous defence. There has been a tenancy for teams to run through us from midfield, it has been evident for the last 5 years culminating in Galway three weeks ago waltzing through for goal chance after goal chance. Unfortunately the likes of Jimmy Nallen and Gardiner in the half back were too nice and not aggressive enough. I'm much happier to see the likes of Howley and Higgins in the half back line. If it moves hit it, if it doesn't move, hit it until it does.



Anyway for the qualifiers,

Clarke,
Higgins, Nallen, Boyle,
Cunnife, Howley,Higgins
Parsons McGarrity
Mortimer Harte Dillon
Mort Kilcoyne Moran

[the Deel Rover]

I'm astounded about the talk of new managers and changing around the squad. That stuff should be left to the end of the season.  There's a nice blend of youth and experience there at the moment. If the team isn't good enough, so be it. The C McD issue is a non runner, get over it. This snipping in the long grass is nonsense.
It's great to have a competitive team compared to the panels of the eighties and early nineties. Actually there is a young healthy  spine in the team at the moment, Clarke, Higgins, Howley, Parsons, McGarrity, Harte, Dillon. Admittedly we are short a quality full back and full forward.  Sometimes we have to improvise, look at Kerry putting Moynihan at No.3. If Jimmy Nallen is good enough to play wing back, surely he can play full back. He's playing midfield for his club so his fielding ability is not in question.

Is Andy Moran just a blond Brian Moloney. I'm disappointed with his progress so far this year. I thought he would kick on and take over some of the scoring responsibility.

Anyway the biggest problem we have at the moment is a porous defence. There has been a tenancy for teams to run through us from midfield, it has been evident for the last 5 years culminating in Galway three weeks ago waltzing through for goal chance after goal chance. Unfortunately the likes of Jimmy Nallen and Gardiner in the half back were too nice and not aggressive enough. I'm much happier to see the likes of Howley and Higgins in the half back line. If it moves hit it, if it doesn't move, hit it until it does.



Anyway for the qualifiers,

Clarke,
Higgins, Nallen, Boyle,
Cunnife, Howley,Higgins
Parsons McGarrity
Mortimer Harte Dillon
Mort Kilcoyne Moran

haven't seen too many post mentioning  Mc D actually i think your the 1st in a long while