NFL Division One: Mayo 4-26 Roscommon 2-11
What a difference a week makes. Mayo came into the game on the back of a record league defeat in Kerry, while Roscommon served Donegal their only defeat of the campaign. But the Rossies were beaten here by more than they have lost to their neighbours in 34 previous league meetings.
The mercy on Roscommon is that this could easily have been much more than a 21-point loss; Mayo scored only four of their 10 clearcut goal chances on a day where both managers indicated their preference for squad development over chasing the game’s second most important national title.
To be fair to Andy Moran’s selection however, they spared nothing in laying down a marker against a Roscommon side that is likely to return to Castlebar in five weeks for a provincial semi-final.
Whoever won would have contested next Sunday’s Division One final in the event of a Kerry defeat in Armagh, yet Mark O’Dowd opted to make nine changes to his Roscommon team while Moran not only made eight but handed three players their first starts. Two of them, goalkeeper Jack Livingstone and wing back Hugh O’Loughlin, had scored by the 21st minute at which stage Mayo led by only the minimum, mainly because of Ben O’Carroll’s goal two minutes earlier for the visitors.
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Incredibly, Mayo hit the Roscommon net four times in the final 13 minutes of the first half, including two inside a minute by Paul Towey and Jack Carney, with Aidan O’Shea and Ryan O’Donoghue, from the penalty spot, firing the others.
Played in front of an attendance of 9,301, Mayo had scored as much after 32 minutes as they had in 70 the weekend before in Tralee, their opponents having already lost Tim Lambe and his replacement Pearse Frost to injuries and seeing centre back Caelim Keogh spend 10 minutes in the sinbin for a foul on Sam Callinan, which resulted in Mayo’s penalty.
The home side led 4-11 to 1-5 at half-time and with Jack Carney imperious under the kickouts, it was their continued dominance of the midfield sector that gave Mayo the platform to stretch out their lead to 21 points, with six unanswered points, inside 11 minutes of the restart.
Roscommon had traded Conor Carroll for Aaron Brady between the sticks for the second half and while Brady wasn’t nearly as tested, he did deny Cian McHale from scoring a fifth Mayo goal before sub Eoin Colleran eventually ended Roscommon’s scoring drought by firing past Livingstone at the other end, after an excellent layoff from Ben O’Carroll.
But where Mark Dowd resisted the urge to reach for the likes of Diarmuid Murtagh, the league’s top scorer at the start of play, or Enda Smith, both of whom were on the bench, Mayo sprang Cillian O’Connor and Tommy Connor, who became among 15 different Mayo scorers on the day. O’Connor nailed Mayo’s only two-pointer from play. Daire Cregg scored the only one by Roscommon seven minutes before full-time on an otherwise bitterly disappointing afternoon for their fringe contingent.
Mayo: Jack Livingstone (0-0-1, 1 45); Jack Coyne (0-0-1), Rory Brickenden, Diarmuid Duffy (0-0-1); Sam Callinan, Michael Plunkett (0-0-1), Hugh O’Loughlin (0-0-2); Seamus Howard, David McBrien (0-0-1); Jack Carney (1-0-2), Ryan O’Donoghue (1-1-2, 1tpf, 1f), Jordan Flynn (0-0-3); Cian McHale (0-0-3), Aidan O’Shea (1-0-2), Paul Towey (1-0-0). Subs: Cillian O’Connor (0-1-0) and Tommy Conroy (0-0-2) (for O’Shea and Towey 47), Frank Irwin (0-0-1) (for Howard 52), John MacMonagle (for Plunkett 55), Kuba Callaghan (for McHale 58), Sean Morahan (for O’Loughlin 61, inj).
Roscommon: Conor Carroll; Tim Lambe, Eoin McCormack, Niall Higgins; Colm Neary (0-0-1), Caelim Keogh, Robbie Dolan; Shane Cunnane (0-0-1), Conor Ryan; Paul Carey, Conor Hand, Ciaran Lennon; Ben O’Carroll (1-0-1), Daire Cregg (0-1-3, 1f), Cathal Heneghan. Subs: Pearse Frost (for Lambe 10, inj), Declan Kenny (0-0-1) (for Frost 15, inj), Eoin Colleran (1-0-1) (for Heneghan 27), Aaron Brady (for Carroll ht), Jack Duggan (0-0-1) (for Lennon 46), Robert Heneghan (for Carey 66).
Referee: Conor Lane (Cork).
