REACTION FROM THE MAYO CAMP:He kept a pretty cool head when all about him were losing theirs but James Horan admitted that he was going through all kinds of internal misery as he watched Dublin eat into Mayo's lead late in the second half.

Just as the Dubs realised that their defence of the All-Ireland was slipping away, Mayo seemed to hit a wall and Horan returned injured men to the fray to try and maintain a slender and precious lead.

“Dublin got a run on us for the last 15 minutes,” he said afterwards, reflecting on the latest of those days of splendid Mayo hyper-drama.

“We couldn’t get a ball, couldn’t get a break and we seemed to run out of juice for a little bit. They were coming at us in waves so it was last ditch defending.

“But we showed great character in the end and had four or five chances at the end. Didn’t take those but we showed great character and of course, we are delighted.”

As they should be.

Only the most devout of Mayo pundits tipped the county to win this one and nobody predicted they would build a 10-point lead on a Dublin team whose reputation had been founded on solid defence.

Yesterday the All-Ireland champions were shockingly open at times and Mayo were brilliantly accurate.

Up by six points at half-time, they faced a decision as to whether to try to preserve what they had or keep on going. They elected to change nothing.

“We made a decision to drive it off and as much we could,” Horan said. “We just wanted to keep the scoreboard ticking over.”

And their policy was proved correct as their lead soon ballooned to 10. Mayo’s loyal heartland fans were in dreamland and for a few minutes, it appeared as if they might be set to slice and dice the All-Ireland champions entirely.

They were plainly enjoying their football out there. But the pandemonium of the last 20 minutes changed all that.

“I wasn’t even paying attention to the scoreboard,” said Aidan O’Shea, who had put in a huge shift.

“We had two chances after half-time to push it on. Then we started leaking water badly. I am not sure if it was tiredness. Boys were pushing around in a lot of places and they were bound to have a purple patch. It was desperate at the end but I was confident the boys would see it home.”

By doing so, Mayo avoided what would have gone down as a grievous collapse.

As the game spiralled into a furious end-to-end spectacle of melodrama, David Clarke had the poise to get his palms to Bernard Brogan’s out-of-the-blue goal chance with three minutes left: had Dublin scored then, they would probably have gone on to win the game.

“It was a fantastic save,” said Horan. “But David Clarke is a superb ’keeper. A big man and he gets down quickly. It was no surprise to us.”

That is the thing about Mayo.

They have been surprised everybody except themselves. The word from the county all weekend was the squad was very confident coming into this match.

Now we know why. Aidan O’Shea smiled when it was put to him that Mayo had an easy final now against Donegal.

“Nothing easy about Donegal. Two teams who are similar in the last few years. They have got their stuff together and are organised.

“I don’t think they are unbeatable but they will be a seriously tough challenge. Jim McGuinness has them well organised, they have good forwards and they can elect to play an attractive brand of football when they want to. So we have three weeks to get ourselves ready and I think we will.”