Deadly O’Donoghue can’t be left to do it on his own against Roscommon - Billy Joe Padden

BEING totally reliant on one player and that’s never a good place to be no matter how good the player is - and we know how good Ryan O’Donoghue is.

Quite simply, he was a force of nature against New York, particularly in the first half where he scored 1-11 out of a final tally of 1-13.

You’d wonder if Kevin McStay was sitting there at half-time saying: “Should we get Ryan to sit up here, put his hamstrings on ice and maybe take a cold one out of the cooler?”

Obviously, any team that is going against Mayo will have to come up with a plan for Ryan O’Donoghue. Their job might be a bit easier if he is a bit further out the field, like he was for much of the second half on Sunday.

It’s great that he has that flexibility. That means if he is bottled up at the ‘D’ you can bring him out the field, where he is just as effective. Some of his hand passing and kick passing when he is out there is fantastic. You saw it against Derry when he was the creator force from long balls he was playing in.

But why would you leave O’Donoghue on for so long in a game that was effectively over at half-time?

I’m delighted with the form he has shown, but he did seem to taper off as the game went on.

You want to see Tommy Conroy backing himself and getting on the scoresheet more often.

You want to see Aidan O’Shea backing himself to take shots – even though he was lively in the opening stage.

You want to see Fergal Boland clipping over a couple more shots also. It was good to see Cillian O’Connor and Paul Towey taking on shots when they came on in the second half, because you don’t want to see O’Donoghue take on all the responsibility.

I was quite happy with David McBrien in midfield. He gives us something different. He’s really good at driving forward with the ball. We saw that in the game last year in Galway where he went forward and got a great goal.

You can ask questions about the two goals that Mayo conceded. Are they similar to the goals that Mayo conceded against Derry a couple of weeks ago? Yes.

But let’s give the lads the benefit of a doubt, in that it was on an unusual artificial surface, in an unusual environment with the game already won, so maybe there was a little bit of complacency in there.

But conceding these goals is something we have been worried about since the league, so it is a cause for concern.

We saw Colm Reape sweeping again, which I thought was interesting.

In one sense, he did really well, apart from one ball that went over the top that could’ve ended up a goal chance for New York.

There was a bit of indecision between Rory Brickenden and Reape when Killian Butler won the ball, didn’t wait to take his mark, turned and tried to lob Reape as he was out of his goal.

That happened twice. One occasion the ball went wide and on the other the ball went over the bar.

Those are the kinds of opportunities that Roscommon will pinpoint for two weeks’ time.

What does it all mean for Roscommon? Not a whole lot.

There are certainly players Mayo will rely on against the Rossies, namely; Ryan O’Donoghue, Paddy Durcan, Jordan Flynn (if he is available), Jack Coyne, David McBrien and Jack Carney.

We will have to see improvements in the full-back line and the full-forward line for the championship campaign ahead.

We do have one outstanding performer in the full-forward line in Ryan O’Donoghue and we have seen some adequate defensive play in the full-back line, but we probably need to see it go up a level again in Hyde Park.

The most important thing from the weekend in New York is that you win - and that was boxed off early on. The other important thing is that you don’t come back with any additional injuries.

Only Tommy Conroy got a hard wallop and hopefully that isn’t an issue for the next game.

Other than that, there is the issue of dealing with the recovery from the travelling. Some lads will have to get back to work on Tuesday or Wednesday and go back to training, and then you are in a really short lead up to the Roscommon game.

I hope some of the lads got some time to enjoy themselves in America.

As I mentioned in last week’s column, I always felt that the team building and bonding is a particularly useful experience when you are in an unfamiliar environment like New York.

I feel it would be great if the Mayo fans who revelled in Times Square got an opportunity to socialise with the team after the game. That is an important element of the occasion and something I always enjoyed when I went to New York as a player.

However, with the modern game and the tight turnaround between championship games, that social element is maybe not as prevalent as it used to be.

Still, those trips to New York are often the start of a great season.