PREVIEW: Mayo Under-20s preparing to defend Connacht crown

MAYO begin their U-20 campaign in Tubbercurry on Wednesday evening against Sligo.

The team is managed by Keith Higgins, a man who captained the county to the All-Ireland U-21 title back in 2006 and was one of the finest inter-county defenders of a generation.

The Ballyhaunis dual-star is in his first season in the bainisteoir's bib after a number of campaigns in the back-room team.

He now takes charge of a squad captained by Parke's Colm Lynch who is backed up by vice-captains Tom Lydon and Rio Mortimer.

Higgins sat with the media this week and spoke about the past, present and future.

Q: Is this grade about developing players or trying to win something?

A: As someone said to me once, the best way of developing players is winning, so you just go all out to try and put your focus on going and winning something.

I think there's a bit of both in it, to be quite honest.

You look at, even when you're picking your panel, you're probably looking at maybe getting half of a certain number of people who are going to be under-age again next year, so you're building for the future as well as looking to be as competitive as possible.

Q: You played U-21 for Mayo 20 years ago. What has changed in terms of preparation in the intervening years? 

A: THEY'RE two different eras – 20 years apart.

Back in 2005 and 2006, when I was under-21, you rocked up for training Tuesday and Thursday, and you played the game Saturday and that was it.

Whereas now, you're monitoring, the amount of time guys are training and they obviously have their S&C and gym work to be doing.

That's all monitored and it's tailored week by week depending on what games they're on.

There's probably just a lot more education there for them in terms of nutritional advice and all that type of thing now.

No more than in the senior game the whole thing has progressed hugely in the last 20 years. 

We don't have the same time commitments or resources that you'd put into a senior team, but at the same time, there's still a lot more available for the guys than there was 20 years ago.

You're trying to give these guys as much education as possible.

You're trying to prep them in terms of what's the right type of S&C to be doing, making sure they're doing it properly and giving them as much nutritional advice as you can.

You're trying to give them a bit of support as well then off the field in terms of whether it's college or school or work or whatever. 

Q: What's your preferred style of play for this squad?

A: MY whole thing with this age group is we don't want to put in a huge amount of structure or being too over-reliant on tactics and all that.

When you have the likes of Darragh Beirne and Tom Lydon and Oisin Deane and these guys, you just want to go and let them play and express themselves and show what they can do.

Obviously you have to have a small bit of structure in terms of what you want to do defensively and how you want to set up, but when it comes to attacking style, the way the game has gone, there will be times in the game where it may be a more structured attack.

But the majority of the time, we just want to go and let these guys play and let them express themselves. 

That's the main message for me with these guys - just to go and play.

Obviously you're giving them bits of guidance then along the way in terms of whether to try and create that bit of space or the movement required.

I'm not the best one to be giving Darragh Beirne tips on how to play as a corner forward, but I see it from the opposite point of view in terms of what defenders don't want to do.

I have the conversation with them around that type of thing where a defender doesn't want to see a corner forward go on or position himself or win the ball. So there's bits and pieces like that that you give them along the way.

Kobe McDonald has been central to a lot of football conversations recently. What are you seeing from him in training?

He just looks like a guy who really just is enjoying things at the moment/ I think we've probably seen that even from the goal against Monaghan - he wasn't afraid to give that bit of a celebration.

He just loves playing football. He loves being out on the pitch, he loves kicking ball.

I think he takes it very seriously when he needs to as well, but he seems to be the type of guy who really loves being on that pitch and really loves playing football. 

He's a big guy for an 18-year-old, he's very, very athletic.

We've seen him in the club championship last year out midfield winning kickouts and then we've seen the burst of pace he has to get that goal against Monaghan, and he's able to kick off both feet.

We haven't bogged him down in too much information. He'd do a majority of his training with the seniors and I think the less information, from our point of view, the better.

We keep it very simple, in terms of the game plan anyways.

We know where he wants to be on our kick out and opposition kick out, and then after that it's just a case of going and playing.

So for us, if we're going to be honest, it's nearly a case of less is more. We don't try to bog him down or anything like that.

Obviously Andy will kind of give him the types of instructions they want to play with the seniors, but from our point of view, it's just go and play.

I'm not going to tell Kobe McDonald how he should be operating as a forward. Like I said, you give him a few bits and pieces that, from a defender's point of view, you don't want them doing.