Seán Rice
AS Ruislip nears, and Mayo roar into the final stages of preparation for their championship clash with London, speculation surrounds the selectors’ choice for midfield.
After months of experiments with the FBD and Allianz leagues, and endless midfield variations you would have expected that a settled duo would be in place by now.
But changing circumstances force different combinations. Normally, Ronan McGarrity would have been seen as the one midfield constant, an automatic choice, the one for which a suitable partner has be sought.
No doubt the experience of the Ballina man and his fielding ability are his chief assets. But injury has sidelined him for some time, and even if it clears up before the championship begins, McGarrity won’t have enough match practice to enable his star to fully shine.
So who is in contention?
Jason Gibbons, James Kilcullen, Aidan O’Shea, Seamus O’Shea and Donal Vaughan are among the candidates to whom the selectors will turn over the coming weeks.
James Kilcullen has played himself back into contention after some solid performances for his club. And he has been given a fairer chance of rehabilitation by James Horan than was given him by John O’Mahony during his three-year reign.
In whatever games he had played before Horan took charge, Kilcullen failed to impress, but the potential was always evident in his many sound performances for Ballaghaderreen.
In Mayo’s recent challenge against Antrim, he performed solidly, fielding well and delivering accurately. He lacks certain mobility, but compensates in terms of strength and composure.
Jason Gibbons has been steadily clawing out a permanent berth at midfield as a mobile and industrious operator. The pace of his progress is not as fast as was expected, but as a worker that covers the entire field, the Ballintubber man’s potential is rich, and with experience will be achieved.
Donal Vaughan’s performances for Ballinrobe at midfield are unlikely to divert the selectors’ attention from placing him in defence. And lack of match practice may also keep Seamus O’Shea out of the first team for a while.
But for this writer his brother, Aidan, thrives in no position like midfield. Having waited for the Breaffy man to blossom in one of several forward positions for the county, none has come so close to extracting from him the potential we know is there than midfield.
In that position he was superb on the defeated under U-21 team. He played well enough against Cork to hold on, and his performance for his club against Kiltimagh in the second half was further evidence that midfield is the position to which he is best suited.
So there is no shortage of sound midfield material around, but to choose the most suitable pair may take a little more time.
MEANWHILE, if Mayo succeed against London in two weeks time, one hell of a semi-final is in store for followers at McHale Park when the two old rivals lock horns once more.
Despite their drop to Division 2, the vibrations of a Galway revival could be felt all round Connacht with their late victory over Armagh and draw with Dublin. They did not stem the slide, but will have instilled hope for the championship.
The All-Ireland triumph of their under 21s is also a timely boost for the county, and senior manager Tomas O Flatharta has lost no time in calling up six members of the successful side to join his squad.
They link up with Colin Forde (U-21 skipper), Jonathan Duane and Danny Cummins, current members of the senior side, and look set for a big future in Galway football.
Here in Mayo we can only reflect on what might have been. It is difficult to understand how tamely our own under 21s surrendered to Roscommon in the first round – a squad of players, who came close to an All-Ireland minor victory, so shamefully neglected in the intervening years.
Will Croke Park hear Achill cry?
PAUL McNAMARA’S cry from the heart in last week’s Mayo News for his decimated football team will have found an echo in the heart of every manager of a rural football team in every corner of the province.
It is the 1950s revisited.
We who grew up then watched despairingly the daily departure of our friends and relatives, and the pallid skeletons of teams that remained after their stars left, and the spirit had been drained from them.
Mayo football never truly recovered from the demonic depression of that ruthless decade, when the platforms of railway stations were wet with the tears of those leaving… and those left behind. Few ever returned.
It was a terrible time, and if emigration nowadays to Australia and Chicago and England doesn’t seem quite so final as it did then, teams are still robbed of their best talent . . . and in many instances the country has lost its redemptive potential.
So, as we stagger back into the abyss you wonder is anyone paying attention. Achill loses ten footballers to England, America, Australia and mainland Europe, the core of their intermediate team. And Castlebar is about to lose four of their best players for the summer months. Others are also feeling the pinch.
“The backbone of the team has emigrated,” said Achill manager McNamara. “Lads started to tell us they were leaving in January, and it’s continued since, one after another.”
And he felt the GAA should be doing more to provide summer work for students.
Back in the eighties, government sponsored FÁS schemes provided summer work for many students. It kept them at home and busy, and much useful work was completed. No similar scheme is likely now because of the economic bind in which the country is caught up.
But Paul McNamara believes the GAA could set up coaching courses and training camps for the summer months which would provide some students with an incentive to stick around for the summer.
How feasible that is, I’m not sure. But despite warnings from club officers throughout many parts of the country the powers that-be have remained eerily silent.
Rossies count cost of NY trip
ROSCOMMON set the championship ball rolling in Connacht with their rather easy win over New York.
It was a flying start for the provincial champions and compensated for the Division 4 league final defeat by Longford, a defeat seen by some as having Roscommon — unlike Galway last season — better prepared for the New York challenge.
But these annual visits to America are becoming costly affairs with county boards forced to fork out as much as €50,000 for each trip.
Grants from the Connacht Council come to a similar sum, but as the screw of economic depression continues to tighten the boards are questioning the viability of the project, which costs around €100,000 and from which no practical advantage is gained.
It seems to me that Croke Park will have no option but to join with the Connacht Council in funding the venture if the western counties are to continue with the project.
Meanwhile, the Connacht Final on July 17 will be televised live by TV3 for the second year in a row. The semi-final between Roscommon and either Sligo or Leitrim is being covered live by RTE on June 12, as will the second semi-final between Galway and either Mayo or London at MacHale Park, Castlebar on June 26.
Just a thought …
IN commencing work on a new €3.2 million Centre of Excellence, Sligo GAA Board have struck a blow for courage and optimism against the tide of economic depression that has begun to engulf our society.
