Mayo GAA Discussion

St Brigids in Roscommon fans also as in the 90s he led them to their first county title since the 60s and was involved in their first ever Connacht title won in the 00s. Mayo hadn't reached All Ireland senior final since 1951 before he became manager and a good few of that 1989 senior team was part of 1983 U21 All Ireland winning managed by John. RIP

Agreed. It's crazy.

Tyrone have had a couple of interesting moves straight off the training ground that have worked wonderfully well for them… though even then it's a rare sight for them rather than a common one.

It'll be interesting to watch if the new 'advantage' change or just the 20/45 positioning change manage to make it through. The advantage in particular (especially if combined with a 4 point goal) could see an increase in use as it gives a huge opportunity to attack sides & not having to fear the turnover so much.

John O' Mahoney and his team in 1989 gave so many Mayo people our first experience of our team being in an All Ireland final.

As one of those Mayo people I will forever be grateful.

R.l.P

Not sure the decision was his own. On June 24th. 2024 in an interview with Michael Verney Irish Indeoendent, he said he was looking for a new three year contract with Leitrim.

RIP John O'Mahony

When you think about it, a connacht championship beating Roscommon, Galway & Mayo, surely one of the greatest achievements ever in the GAA?

1989 started something very special for us.

I think that team had reached the end of their life cycle and a rebuild had to be done, but to lose him over not being able to choose his own selectors (no matter how different times were, that will always seem to be incredibly stupid) was yet another reason why the County Board and Mayo football is one of the biggest obstacles in our quest for Sam. We're our own worst enemies at times. It was 5 years wasted and a lot of "what ifs" asked. Johnno was a smart operator though and never took a job where there wasn't the playing talent to make it a success. Fair play to him, he achieved a lot and deserves respect for doing so. It's just another one of those "what ifs" had he been left to finish the job in Mayo the first time around……

Great 90 minute interview with Aidan O Shea

Reinforced all my perceptions (positive ) of him and some of the negatives of supporters within our county

Spot on about Joe Canning. I couldn’t believe the abuse he used to get in some areas of Galway when the intercounty team lost. It was personal stuff . Very parochial mindset ! One of the greatest ever but it was like they were hoping he would fails so they could say “I told you so”.

Weird

It’s not as bad towards OShea and has definitely softened this year but there was an element of jealousy about it as well

The GAA doesn't want people with personalities outside the game because they can't exploit them.

Boyler was never under-rated in Mayo, he was everyones favourite player!

Doherty and to a lesser extent McLoughlin were possibly under-rated alright

I'm not talking about as a player. I'm talking about the GAA making more of their personalities off the field. O'Shea is very popular with kids, he generates conversation and instead of GAA people taking advantage of it, it's treated as some terrible thing to even have a personality outside of the game. D

If you listen to his interview this week, he says he never does anything outside of the permission of the set up and always runs things by the team. He also criticised the notion that players should be unavailable in the run up to games and they discussed the fact that very few other sports have such a terrible relationship with the media as GAA does - this allergic reaction people have to players even doing an interview ffs. There are two semifinals this weekend for example, and hardly a word spoken about either of them all week. Barely any build up or excitement. It's bad for the promotion of the games to have players and managers unavailable, rejection of media etc. And not only that, if a player does make themselves available, they get criticised by other GAA people. Aidan had people criticising him for even talking to some kids who wanted his attention because it's a "distraction". Completely ridiculous stuff.

mayo should feel sick looking at how this year is playing out, even if they had their big chance a few years ago and blew it

of course we were good enough to beat them!

A combination of poor refereeing and over-conservatism is why we lost. we turned down scoring opportunities which would/should have seen us win relatively comfortably.

Our inability to close out a game cost us against Galway, Dublin and Derry.

We were good enough to win all those games, and with the right approach, we'd be good enough to win the All-Ireland this year. Galway and Armagh!? Does anyone think we couldn't beat them!??

I disagree, I think there's a difference between the players being good enough, and the coaching,/game plan being good enough.

see donegal where they were last year to where they are this year. Still not the finished article, but mcguinness made a massive difference in a few months

sorry got my wires crossed

yes any interview he dose he comes across very well , a really sound guy by the sounds of it , he is entitled to whatever he gets on the side , , the people complaining about it are the ones that were at home during the winter watching the champions league or coronation st, while the rain was banging against the front window of the house

it was the likes of aidan that was out in that rain training, so if he's not entitled to something now forget about it

You can add a very average management team, lack of quality forwards, aging players to that as well. It is unbelievable that after what was witnessed over the last few years, people would cop the hell on. Disillusion stuff tbh

we'd be good enough to win the All-Ireland this year. Galway and Armagh!? Does anyone think we couldn't beat them!??

In an All Ireland final?

I'd say we couldn't beat them.

We've never stepped up in an All Ireland final and beaten a team we should beat.

I do think Kerry were the better team on that day to be fair. But there was a hesitancy in the first half from Kerry, It felt like they were afraid to lose it. I think this year its 50/50 for the final and I think this Galway team is much improved from 2022.

From what I have seen in the development of other teams as the season unfolded, I think that gap is bigger than you think. I think Dublin, Kerry, Galway, Armagh, Donegal are well ahead of Mayo. Mayo may be able to beat them the odd time and keep the illusion going that we are close to the top table. But I reckon when it comes to the business end of the Championship, that all those teams will beat Mayo 9 out of 10 times.

I'd have Mayo alongside the likes of Roscommon, Cork, Tyrone, Derry etc. Mayo lack leaders and players with determination that the bigger teams have. The likes of Rian O'Neill, Stefan Campbell, Ciaran Kilkenny, Fenton, McCarthy, Paul Conroy, Sean Kelly, Paudi Clifford, Diarmuid O'Connor (Kerry). Those guys will grasp a game by the neck, and die with their boots on to get their team over the line. Paddy Durkin is our man I guess, but he is always out injured. We used to have those personalities in the likes of Keegan, Boyle, Higgins, Barrett, Andy Moran. And that is a lot of the reason that led to the great decade or so we had from 2012 onwards. But we don't have that right now. Hopefully players will grow in to that type of role e.g. Sam Callinan

Jesus lads will ye let this thread go quiet for the next few weeks. Its embarrassing at this stage continuously seeing it at the top of the GAA forum, we were knocked out weeks ago.

As a Mayo man living in Galway its sickening enough having to put up with it without logging on here and seeing the Mayo chat thread being bumped with talk of how we should be in the final or how we can beat anyone on any given day or how we were rode by X ref or how Galway got an easy route to the final etc.

You can't talk about it seems once you get knocked out.

We all know what the problems are. A lack of scoring forwards. Changing the management team is not going to fix that.

Thats ground up changes that are needed and changes to alot of management style at club level away from the ultra defensive muck they are serving up at club level.

Last year club final was absolute ****.