Mayo minors get the better of Leitrim

Connacht Minor Football Championship

ROUND 4
Mayo 1-17
Leitrim 1-13

IT was far from the perfect performance, but Mayo did enough to book their place in the Connacht Under-17 football championship semi-final with a hard-fought victory over Leitrim at Pairc Seán MacDiarmada in Carrick-on-Shannon on Friday evening.
Their second victory of the campaign means that Seán Deane’s charges will play Roscommon in the last four and turns their final group game against Sligo next Friday evening into a ‘dead rubber’.
Mayo played in fits and starts against a Leitrim team that were chasing their first victory of the championship, and there were times when they looked very impressive.
However, there were also plenty of occasions when Mayo’s application and concentration dropped off and they were fortunate that Leitrim were unable to capitalise on their lack of intensity and carelessness.
On a lovely evening for a game, Mayo led at half-time by 1-7 to 0-8.
A brilliant goal from Colm Lynch on 20 minutes gave the visitors some breathing space at the break, but Leitrim were left cursing their luck after the impressive Paul Honeyman clipped the butt of the post with a penalty on 16 minutes.
The sides were level three times in the first quarter with attack-minded corner-back James Lavelle, Tom Lydon and Darragh Beirne kicking the best of Mayo’s scores.
Then Honeyman missed his penalty, Colm Lynch weaved his way through to hit the Leitrim net at the other end, and Josh Carey tacked on a neat point to leave Mayo ahead by 1-7 to 0-6 after 30 minutes.
Leitrim rallied though to close the gap at the interval with well-worked scores from Joshua Maye and Brian Keaney.
We expected Mayo to up the ante after the restart and they did, with James Lavelle and Tom Lydon landing fine scores to double their lead — 1-9 to 0-8.
They then seized the advantage even further and reeled off five points without reply in the space of nine minutes from Colm Lynch (2), Tom Lydon and Darragh Beirne (free) to pull ahead by eight points, 1-14 to 0-9 after 49 minutes.
It was around about that stage that Mayo’s minds started to wander a little as the game looked to be done.
But Leitrim were never going to fade away and they came roaring back into contention when Ruairi O’Rourke nicked a point before Paul Honeyman palmed in a goal from close-range on 51 minutes.
The home crowd were enthused by the prospect of a late ambush, but Mayo responded to this mini-revival with three points in as many minutes from Tom Lydon, Josh Carey (a mark) and Thomas Tuffy to restore their seven point advantage.
With time almost up, Mayo would have been expected to see the game out from there but, instead, Leitrim laid siege to the visitor’s goal in the remaining seven minutes and they dug out three points without reply from Ruairi O’Rourke and Paul Honeyman (2 frees).
The final whistle sounded to signal a Mayo win that sends them into the semi-final, but they also left plenty of room for improvement.

Mayo
Conor Meaney (Westport); James Lavelle (0-2, Belmullet), Eoin McGreal (Garrymore), Yousif Coghill (Breaffy); Jamie Clarke (Moy Davitts), Rio Mortimer (Claremorris), Fionan O’Reilly (Castlebar Mitchels); Tiernan Egan (Hollymount/Carramore), Shane Cunningham (Castlebar Mitchels); Colm Lynch (1-2, Parke), Tom Lydon (0-5, 1f, The Neale), Senan Guilfoyle (Eastern Gaels); Darragh Beirne (0-4, 3fs, Claremorris), Josh Carey (0-2, 1mark, Kiltane), Gavin Forry (Castlebar Mitchels).
Subs used: Dara Neary (Parke) for McGreal; Thomas Tuffy (0-1, Swinford) for O’Reilly (inj); Fionán Burke (Kiltimagh) for Forry; Conor Ryder (Moy Davitts) for Cunningham (inj); Seán Walsh (Killala) for Guilfoyle.

Leitrim
S Carolan-Morris (0-1, ‘45); O Foley, E McNamara, K Russell; D Greenan, D Gardiner, J McNamee; C McLoughlin, J Gilheaney (0-1); B Keaney (0-1), F Curley, A Gethins; D Wisley, J Maye (0-2), P Honeyman (1-6, 5fs).
Subs used: B McBride for Curley; A Gardiner for Gethins; R O’Rourke (0-2) for Maye (inj); C Moran for Keaney; F Cullen for McNamee (inj).

Referee: B Healy (Sligo)