Timely scoring boost for Mayo

Connaught Telegraph March 1996


FBD Connaught League March 1996

Mayo 2-11 ------------ Sligo 0-11

By John Melvin

For a team that has been living on the breadline in terms of scoring power, the scoreline was as important as the result in this Connaught F.B.D. League match at Markievicz Park on Sunday. This latest win would appear to assure Mayo of a place in the final, although they have yet to play Galway who went down to Roscommon but it did keep intact their unbeaten record in the both the National and Connaught League.

However, what will give the Mayo mentors most encouragement from this game was the improved scoring power from a weakened team that had to be rearranged due to the withdrawal of David Brady due to an injury while John Madden, Kevin Cahill, Dermot Flanagan, Liam McHale, Pat Fallon, Kevin O'Neill, Anthony Finnerty, David Nestor were all on duty elsewhere.

Brady's absence from the original selection forced the deployment of James Nallen to midfield where he more than held his ground with James Horan, while Kevin Beirne capably handled the full back duties entrusted to him and for which Nallen had been originally selected for.

The game also marked the return to duty of Declan Shaw, Brendan Heneghan, Kenneth Mortimer, who was excellent, Ronan Golding and Diarmuid Byrne, all of whom did quite well. the Balla player looked eager, linking well and providing good ball, while Diarmuid Byrne picked off some good points and provided the final pass for Tom Reilly to end a very good move to the net in the 18th minute.

That goal came at a time when Sligo were very much in the game but a succession of wides, eight in the first half, seemed to eat away at their confidence and their resistance collapsed entirely midway through the second half when Ray Dempsey was first to react to a ball which came off the crossbar and his goal gave Mayo a 2-8 to 0-7 lead, and a lead they later extended to nine points.

It was a frustrating afternoon for Sligo manager P.J. Carroll who watched too many of his players shirk their responsibilities. Mayo on the other hand were always confident, assured and moved the ball quickly out of defence and made more use of the long ball. Their passing, while not always accurate, improved greatly on some of their National League outings, but it must be said Sligo made them look awfully good at times and that would be a foolish premise to build up hopes too high of overcoming Meath in the National League quarter final at a date and venue yet to be fixed.

However, with the odd exception, it was gratifying to see Mayo put some creative moves together and take some simple scores with overcomplicating which Sligo tended to do. Credit too must be given for their willingness to work hard and read situations much better than their opponens. In essence, Mayo were the better drilled side, particularly in the second half when they began to play as a team.

A typical example of this was an excellent move downfield which was followed up by Noel Connelly who finished with a simple tap over in front of the posts. Tom Reilly and Ray Dempsey imposed themselves on the game with Reilly popping up everywhere as a roving full forward and laying off some very good ball to his colleagues.

However, the Sligo pressure was coming from Eamon O'Hara, Paul Taylor, Paul Durcan, Ciaran Shannon, Benny Deignan and Bernard Mulhern who played well throughout and had more of their colleagues matched their displays, Sligo would have been a lot closer in the end.

However, unlike Mayo, Sligo had to work extremely hard for their scores. They had two points to show after fifteen minutes, both coming from Paul Taylor while John Casey (free) and Diarmuid Byrne levelled for Mayo before Tom Reilly snapped up the lead for Mayo and it was Nallen, Dempsey and Byrne who created the move which Reilly finished low to the corner of the net Eamon O'Hara and Ciaran Shannon responded with good points for Sligo, but an excellent point from Byrne and a well struck free from Casey gave Mayo an interval advantage of 1-5 to 0-5.

An early P.J. Loftus point, followed by another from Dempsey, who was well spotted by Golding, Byrne again, who was released by Reilly, and Dempsey's goal, settled any argument by the 45th minute.

Mayo:

B. Heffernan, K. Mortimer. K. Beirne, B. Heneghan, D. Shaw, P. Holmes, N. Conneely (0-1); J. Nallen, J. Horan, J. Casey (0-2); R. Dempsey (1-3); R. Golding, D. Byrne (0-3); P.J. Loftus (0-1);, T. Reilly (1-1). Subs: D. Jennings for Casey.

Sligo:

D. Eames, M. McCormack, J. Lyons, C. White, D. Durkin, B. Deignan, B. Mulhern, P. Durcan (0-1); C. Shannon (0-1); P. Doohan (0-1); E. O'Hara (0-3); P. Taylor (0-4); N. Carey, G. Dooner, K. Barrins. Subs: F. Feeney (0-1) for Barrins, B. Kilcoyne for Dooner


Connaught Telegraph - News - Mar 1996

Connaught Telegraph - Sports - Mar 1996