Offaly vs. Mayo

[Bord na Mona man]

What's the feeling about this one? Scott Brady is supposed to be back.

We don't really have a good record against Mayo. They're the only big name county that we haven't beaten in recent times. We've lost to them the last few times in league, challenges, junior and senior All Ireland semis.
I felt Mayo were a good outside bet to win the league as they tend to take it seriously.

Mayo's attacking against Kerry looked more direct than Cork's was against us.
Remember we've done very well against handpassing teams like Leix and Cork, but we are still have to prove ourselves against a better attacking side.

Apart from Brady coming back, we've named the same line up as last week.
According to the Biff (who could be winding us up), the Offaly team named is:

P Kelly;
K Lynam, S Casey, B Mooney;
N Coughlan, S Brady, N Grennan;
R Connor, A McNamee;
J Reynolds, C McManus, L Mooney;
T Deehan, P Kellaghan, N McNamee.

[The Biff]

I lifted that team list from the Examiner's Breaking News section yesterday. I cant say that I expect Offaly to win this, but I do expect another good showing. Whether Brady is fit or not to start, it's encouraging to be able to field a winning team again. Injuries will usually force enough changes later.

If I wanted to wind you up (though I'm not into shooting fish in a barrell), I could say something like ......... Tullamore GAA are now charging the Offaly team and mentors for parking their cars across from O'Connor Park. But sure even you would hardly believe something like that.

http://www.unison.ie/sportsdesk/stories ... si=1557021

[Lone Shark]

This new all out defence should suit us for playing Mayo, particularly as they have no McDonald to open us up with. They still are favourites on paper, clearly, but 2/5 Mayo and 9/4 us with PP seems excessive to my mind.

The handicap based on this would be four points - which I would certainly back.

We'll need to keep goals out - if we can stay patient, hopefully frustrate Mayo into spilling forward, it's the kind of game that we could nick - but in truth I'd say something like 2-9 to 0-11 is the likely end score, with Mayo on top.

[Bord na Mona man]

If I wanted to wind you up (though I'm not into shooting fish in a barrell), I could say something like ......... Tullamore GAA are now charging the Offaly team and mentors for parking their cars across from O'Connor Park. But sure even you would hardly believe something like that.

http://www.unison.ie/sportsdesk/stories ... si=1557021

Listen Biff, we've had enough of your wind ups. I'm not even going to bother clicking on that link!

[Lone Shark]

So what happened?

At half time everything seemed rosy - by all accounts we were unlucky to be only a point up, we were dominating the middle, and using the ball well - and then it all went askew?

Were Mayo that good? - two Mayo people have said to me it was as good as they've ever seen their team play.

Is Ross Connor really starting to look like a midfield option? All the scores seemed to come from the Mayo half forward line rather than the full line - does that mean our novice 2-4 group are doing okay?

Thomas Deehan is scoring steadily - is he looking like the real deal now? Did Paschal play withdrawn again - how did he do?

Come on reporters, I'll be back for the next game, but in the meantime I need you!!

[Barracuda]

Well LS twas like this............

Mayo pulled all their half forward line back into defence at the start of the 2nd half and hit long early ball into their full line from midfield and chased in on it at pace.
The long ball ploy worked very well as it unsettled us. Till then Mayo as with Cork were trying to carry the ball without much joy past a solid half back line who were well supported by our half forwards.
Once Mayo suceeded in creating the gap then they hit long ball for a while and rattled us early on.
Once on top,we folded which was more than worrying. Yes indeed Mayo were flying - like Meath the other week and unstoppable once in their stride- full of running and energy whereas we were truly bunched and flat as the proverbial pancake, by the way when is pancake Tuesday- did i miss it ??

[An Bearcán Bearaigh]

As good as they've seen Mayo play Lone Shark? Sounds like a terrible case of believing the hype I'm afraid. What about the games against Galway and Tyrone in the 2004 Championship? Selective memories there I'm afraid.

I thought - for what it's worth - that Offaly deserved their lead at the end of the first half and they had outscored Mayo in scores, if you get me - six scores for Mayo's 1-5 to eight for Offaly's 0-8. The problem with Offaly was they only had the one half in them, and Mayo pulled away fairly easily after that.

Taking off McNamee struck some of us watching as an odd sideline decision. Taking off young Connor at midfield when Offaly were dominating there too seemed odd as well. As for the Shark's question about your full-back line, I think you might want to wait and see - Mayo's full-forward line would have a few issues at the moment.

Someone might post about how that Offaly lad that was stretchered off is getting on. I saw him being loaded into the ambulance and it wasn't pretty. I hope he's ok.

[seamroga]

It's always necessary to remember when analysing G.A.A. games that mediocre teams regularly hold out against good (better) teams until half time.
I have to say I was hugely impressed by Offaly in the first half, particularly our ability to hit three points in a row on two separate occasions, including after Mayo's goal.
However, we had the breeze at our backs during that period and when Mayo stepped up a couple of gears in the second half, we were lost. Reality hit home very quickly.
Mayo's ability to carry the ball at speed up the field required players like Ciaran Mc to do an awful lot of tracking back and that couldn't be sustained for 70 minutes.
When it came to the crunch, Mayo didn't mind running with the ball at Offaly players because they (the Mayo players) were bigger, stronger and fitter in a lot of cases. Offaly's half forward line - Leonard Mooney and Sean Ryan aren't the biggest players - couldn't stop their opponents going forward so there was little our half back line could do against an onslaught.
As far as I'm concerned, Scott Brady, Neville Couglan and Ciaran McManus couldn't be faulted. And I expect Sean Casey to earn himself a place on the starting 15 in the championship, more than likely at corner back. Our full back line was helped by Mayo's continued decision to hand Conor Mortimor a starting place. Personally, I wouldn't have him on the Offaly team and I expect Mayo to line out with Ciaran McDonald at corner forward in the championship, probably instead of Mortimor.
But back to Offaly. We have too many small men. And let's be honest, some of our fringe players aren't up to this level, as was obvious following their introduction.
Thomas Deehan certainly isn't back to his best yet and I would actually have substituted him ahead of Niall McNamee. We all were happy with the win over Cork, but let's be honest, the Leesiders were brutal that day and with Monaghan and Fermanagh achieving excellent results at the weekend, I think we will be in trouble.

[Bord na Mona man]

Looks like our hope that Fermanagh and Monaghan would ship a string of beatings and finish below us might not be coming to pass.
The consensus seemed to be that earning 6 points would see a team safe.
Fermanagh already have 4 points and still have 5 more games.
The possible docking of points from Dublin in Tyrone could send the whole thing haywire.
Needless to say, they would be extra determind to win the remaining games were that to happen.

Maybe our best hope is that Cork's bad run continues and that we take maximum points vs Fermanagh and Monaghan.

[Lone Shark]

Frpom the point of view of looking towards the summer, a league game where you lose by eight points is no disaster if you can take some positives out of it.

From what I can tell here:

1) Midfield did okay, for the first half at least. For what has been a problem area for a while, Connor seems to have added something here.

2) Casey seems to be stepping up to the mark in the backs - that's very valuable with so many places up for grabs there.

3) We struggled physically to match Mayo for size - fair enough, but given time, with players like Slattery, Keane and Sullivan due back and likely to give us a lot more scope in this regard, I'd be hopeful that mightn't be as much of an issue in the summer.

4) We all know Niall Mac has talent, but now in Deehan, Coughlan and Ryan we seem to have a couple of players who could also offer a threat on any given day - a greater range than we've had for a while, albeit three players that are a little either unproven or inconsistent as of yet.

Okay, nobody likes to lose, but in the spirit of building towards the summer - I've come out of games with a lot less positive feeling than that. Whether Mayo were as good as all that is another matter, but what can't be disputed is that they were good. This is a top five team, on form and at home - there's no shame in losing.

On the negative side, who was stretchered off? I hadn't heard anything about that.


Nothing has really changed with regard to promotion and relegation - teams will still average 7 points each, not counting any possible deductions for Dublin and Tyrone. 6 points will definitely be enough, and I still can't see anyone being relegated with five. Clearly we have more work to do, but I'd have taken two points from two games at the start, and I'd still be happy with that. If Fermanagh are safe by week seven then that's no bad thing, because then they'll have nothing to play for. I'd be more worried if we had a repeat of 2002, where Cork got to play Tyrone in the last round - Tyrone had hammered everyone else, but they took their foot off the gas in the last game with their semi final place secure, and Cork got to stay up - very annoying. That won't happen for anyone now.

Dublin are there to be beat, Tyrone and Kerry look like outside bets all right, but even then there's no way we won't be safe with six points, which is what I expect us to finish on.

[Fit For Junior]

According to a report I read, Paschal Keelaghan was the player stretchered off.............

[Hyper]

PK was the man, concussion and a bit of internal bleeding behind the eye.

[True Red]

a sore one.hopefully he will be back as he is playing well.

[Lone Shark]

Definitely. As was mentioned above, our forwards aren't exactly the most physically imposing unit of footballers that you'll find - Paschal is well able to look after himself in this regard, so he is certainly someone you'd like to see available for selection.


I forgot to mention that I see David Lowry came on at the weekend as well - how did he do, or was he on long enough to even get on a ball?

[Hyper]

DL didn't enhance hi reputation when he came on, made a fair cock up of one ball..........