First and foremost, this was another impressive win for Mayo. I know Derry aren’t going great but I cannot remember us going to Derry and winning too often.

I know the couple of times I played there we didn’t win, so I think it’s a huge win when you consider the way the table has worked out as well.

We have to give Kevin McStay credit for the impressive run of late. After the hiding we got against Galway, each and every one of us who care about Mayo football would have been biting your hand off to be in the situation we’re in now.

READ: Mayo win exciting league clash in Derry 

Kevin, his management team, and more importantly, his players, who have got themselves out of a very tricky situation with a couple of good performances.

Nothing was perfect but what we did see was marked improvement from a lot of players and what stood out on Sunday were the individual performances, first and foremost. I’ve been quite critical of Mattie Ruane in the last few years in terms of being as physical over the ball in the air as he should have been.

But these new rules seem totally suited to him. The primary job of any midfielder is to contest ball in the middle of the field and when Mattie finds himself in a one-on-one situation against similarly built players as himself, he is thriving.

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He has a great knack of going from a standing start to accelerating past players. On Sunday, there were a couple of instances when he powered past his marker to kick scores and to end up with six points from seven shots was a huge boost for Mayo.

There’s no surprise that the upturn in Mayo’s form has coincided with improvements from players like Mattie. I’m sure he was very excited and very happy coming away from the game, looking forward to the other games.

RULE TWEAKS

Ryan O’Donoghue was excellent too. He’s crucial to Mayo’s chances. Early in the league he wasn’t playing well, but now he’s really sharp. On Sunday, some of his sharpness, his movement and decision-making was outstanding.

The tweaks of the rules over the past week or two really suit Ruane and O’Donoghue and now there’s no waiting around for the goalie to come up and join the attack.

In terms of negatives, Mayo didn’t play many long balls or any direct kicks into the forwards. There was one in the first half that went into Frank Irwin. He won it, but his shot was blocked. There were very few similar deliveries in the second half.

It doesn’t seem to be part of the game plan. If you look at Kerry the night before, Dylan Geaney was putting a ball into David Clifford every time he got the chance.

On Sunday, Derry had a lot of joy on the breaking ball around the middle at times. When the ball breaks there you have to fight to the death to win it and Mayo didn’t do enough of that at time and Derry gained a platform at different periods of the game.

The things that are getting teams into trouble on their own kickout is the lack of understanding of what their own plan is in key situations. So Mayo have to provide clarity in relation to that, and there’s work to do yet in that department.

Colm Reape got loads of good kickouts out, short ones as well, but teams have to have a clear idea about what you want to do on the restarts.

It might be a bit simplistic, but there are times when it might be a case of putting four or five bodies on one side of the field and hammering it out and then everyone fighting it. But everyone has to know that that is the plan.

SETTLING IN

Some of the new players gave a good account of themselves. Conor Reid and Fenton Kelly did absolutely fine without doing anything spectacular. I’ve been impressed with the way Donnacha McHugh has adapted to playing the full-back position and he did well again against Derry. 

Frank Irwin took his goal very well and now feels like he belongs. He knows now that he is genuinely contributing rather than just being tried out. I’m happy to see that because he has the skill set to play full-forward, which is very positive for Mayo.

We have players that we rely on a lot. Stephen Coen, who didn’t start the league well, has been playing well in the last couple of weeks.

Jordan Flynn is a very reliable player and put in a solid shift. He has a killer instinct and showed that in the last play of the first half when the hooter was gone. Derry were coming out with the ball, Mayo had a chance to score, Ryan O’Donoghue created the turnover and Mayo moved the ball up the field.

Flynn could easily have taken the point when he got the ball, but to hit it smack-bang in the bottom corner of the goal from about 15 yards out told all the Derry lads going in at half-time that Mayo meant business.

It’s no surprise to me that it was Jordan pulling the trigger and that Ryan O’Donoghue was heavily involved; two players with that sort of killer instinct and desire to make things happen don’t always take the safe option.

It doesn’t always come off, but sometimes to win big games you have to roll that dice. That was a big factor in getting the win.
I think Kevin McStay will hark back to that killer mentality and will try and get that message across in the coming weeks.

It was a key aspect in today’s game, it will be a key aspect in big games in the summer if you treat games like that. Mayo teams haven’t always done that in the past, but that’s one example of where they did it in the key stage of a game. Long may it continue.

READ: Kevin McStay praises ‘pleasing’ Mayo performance against Derry