Mayo 0-13 Roscommon 0-11:THE SWINGS and roundabouts way of the Connacht championship continued yesterday as Mayo wrestled the title from the holders on a wild afternoon at Hyde Park.
A campaign that began with a less than great escape in London concluded with a fundamentally sound performance which was about mastering the wild gale and rain as much as the opposition
There was a great deal of anticipation around the town before the game, partly caused by the well-attended Roscommon Hospital protest led by Independent TD Luke Flanagan outside Hyde Park.
Inside the ground, the crowd of 25,697 showed up early to see their minors record an impressive win and to enjoy the novel feeling that Roscommon could retain the Nestor Cup.
Instead, everything worked out perfectly for the visitors. There was a patience and control about Mayo which was impressive. They took their first lead of the game in the 63rd minute and although there was always the chance of a greasy goal in the last few minutes of the match, Mayo were good value for their win.
On a day when place-kicking was at a premium, Mayo’s victory was built upon the reliability of Cillian O’Connor. The 19-year-old from Ballintubber was handed the responsibility after impressing James Horan with his accuracy at training in recent weeks. But the quiet of McHale Park on Tuesday evenings is one thing: faced with a notorious wind and a noisy Roscommon crowd, O’Connor grew in the role as the game progressed.
His critical moment arrived in the 38th minute when referee Michael Collins cancelled out a free after becoming impatient with the length of time the Mayo man took in his preamble. It could have been a crushing experience for a relative novice, but O’Connor responded by dispatching four subsequent frees with authority and working his socks off in open play.Late in the match, he won a vital ball which led to Enda Varley landing the last score of the game.
Roscommon, of course, had their clinical marksman at the other end and Donal Shine made the most of what possession came his way, striking two fine points in the first half and landing a 45 and a 53-metre free during that period. But even he found the wind too much to cope with in the second half. Roscommon struggled to get any change out of a disciplined Mayo defence during the second period and their one break came in the 51st minute when a long ball from Senan Kilbride found Shine. He turned neatly but his shot flashed across the wrong side of the cross bar: a goal at this stage would have given Roscommon valuable breathing space at a time when Mayo were still playing catch-up.
Roscommon’s key failure lay in their inability to make more of their possession and dominance during the first half. They did play some nice football through the atrocious weather but their handling was poor at times and after 30 minutes of play they had only built a two-point lead on Mayo. A late burst of points – including a fine effort from the lively Donal Ward – made the half-time situation look a little brighter. Roscommon led by 0-9 to 0-4.
As Fergal O’Donnell conceded afterwards, it wasn’t a big enough gap and the withdrawal of Ward after he clattered into Aidan O’Shea – never a good idea – shortly after the restart was a further blow.
Mayo still had to set about recovering that deficit. It was a day for defenders and Keith Higgins and Tom Cunniffe both had splendid afternoons. Horan’s decision to redeploy Trevor Mortimer at half-back has been key to their summer form. Once again, the Shrule man seemed to relish life in that position, sweeping across the line to clean up ball and placing several excellent balls into his forwards. He hasn’t entirely abandoned life as an attacker either and popped up at the end of an impressive Mayo attack for a one-on-one goal chance that fell apart after Alan Freeman’s final pass went astray.
Equally, pushing Kevin McLoughlin up to the half-forwards is also working; he brings his defensive graft and energy to that position and chipped in with an important first-half point.
In midfield, the O’Shea brothers put in another solid shift and as the game edged into the crucial last 10 minutes, Horan was able to call on the experience of Ronan McGarrity and Peadar Gardiner, who garlanded his reputation for landing crucial Connacht final points with another brave score here in the 70th minute.
It was a crushing score as Roscommon had pushed hard in the previous minute of play, with Robert Hennelly, the Mayo goalkeeper, managing to pluck a Shine effort even as it travelled over his crossbar.
Even in those frantic minutes, Mayo looked assured and advance to the All-Ireland quarter-finals in a happy frame of mind, indifferent to the fact that they will be outsiders in the last eight.
MAYO: 1 R Hennelly; 2 K Higgins, 3 A Feeney, 4 T Cunniffe; 5 R Feeney, 6 D Vaughan, 7 T Mortimer; 8 A O’Shea, 9 S O’Shea; 10 K McLoughlin (0-1), 11 A Dillon (0-1), 12 A Moran (0-1); 13 C O’Connor (0-8, frees), 14 A Freeman, 15 J Doherty. Subs: G Cafferkey for Feeney (53 mins), E Varley (0-1) for Doherty (59 mins), R McGarrity for S O’Shea (64 mins), P Gardiner (0-1) for McLoughlin (67 mins). Yellow cards: Dillon (26 mins), Higgins (34 mins), Doherty (46 mins), A O’Shea (69 mins).
ROSCOMMON: 1 G Claffey; 2 S McDermott, 3 N Carty, 17 S Purcell; 5 D Keenan, 6 P Domican, 7 D Ward (0-1); 8 M Finneran, 9 K Mannion; 10 S O’Grady, 11 K Higgins, 12 C Cregg (0-1); 13 C Devaney, 14 S Kilbride (0-1), D Shine (0-8, 0-3 frees, 0-1 45). Subs: C Dineen for Ward (37 mins), D McDermott for O’Grady (54 mins), S Ormsby for Dineen (61 mins), E Kenny for Kilbride (62 mins), G Heneghan for Devaney (66 mins). Yellow cards: Ward (23 mins), Dineen (38 mins), S McDermott (46 mins), Purcell (57 mins), Cregg (64 mins).
Referee: M Collins (Cork).
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