Howley delivers the goods

A LITTLE bit of history repeating.
The irony won’t have been lost on supporters from both Mayo and Galway.
Pearse Stadium in Salthill was the scene of another nail-biting finish after the latest local derby went all the way to the wire. Just like it had three weeks’ earlier.
That day there were great scenes of celebration when Kevin McStay’s men squeezed out Padraic Joyce’s Tribesmen in a win-or-bust All-Ireland preliminary quarter-final.
Last Saturday it was Michael Moyles’ ladies who nicked a late point to get the better of a Galway team that had designs on All-Ireland success.
But nobody had told Mayo’s Ciara Needham, who made the turnover that changed the course of history, or Shauna Howley who popped up on the end of Needham’s lung-bursting run to palm the winning score over Galway’s crossbar.
“To be fair it’s all Ciara Needham, she made the hard turnover, she made the hard run,” said Howley graciously afterwards.
“I thought we’d gotten a free and that was good enough, but one thing that Peadar Gardiner [Mayo coach] has drilled into us this year is to just ‘get ahead of the ball’.
“So when I saw Ciara making the turnover, I just pumped the legs and tried to get ahead of her. Thankfully, she laid it off and it went over the bar.”
One of the features of Mayo’s performances this year has been their tactical flexibility.
It was something that proved invaluable against Galway after a wind-assisted first half that didn’t quite go to plan, and a second half that saw the visitors hanging on in there at times.
But regardless, they rarely (if ever) took a step back.
“It was an All-Ireland quarter-final, we had nothing to lose, we had to push up,” explained Shauna Howley.
“We probably didn’t utilise the breeze as much as we wanted to in the first half, it was tit-for-tat, a bit like ping-pong, so momentum was key.
“They had a sin-bin as well so we said we’d push up and, while we didn’t get the lead we wanted to, as long as we kept the scoreboard ticking over, and keeping it level or a one point game, that was all that mattered.
“We’re so used to playing Galway at this stage; sometimes they get the better of us and sometimes we get the better of them. Today showed that there’s nothing between the teams, it went right down to the wire.”
Despite being an All Star and one of the best forwards in the country, Howley was kept in reserve by management last weekend so filled the role of ‘impact sub’.
It was a role that the Knockmore woman took very seriously.
“We’re very lucky that we have a healthy competition within the team,” she said.
“The starters today might not be the starters for the next game, so it’s just about getting the best out of yourself and getting the best for the team.
“We’ve dedicated our entire life to this sport, we’re training since November, so it’s days like these you want to be on the pitch.
“For us it’s about focussing on ourselves.
“We’re into an All-Ireland semi-final, we’ve been here for the last two years and we want to go one step further. So you have to learn from your mistakes.
“Some areas need improvement, it could have been a different game if Galway got those goals in the first half. But having said that, we’ll fight for every ball no matter what.
“We’re not a first half team, we’re a 60-minute team.
“Today really utilised the panel and showed that the finishers are just as important as the starters.”