Sam stays put on Saturday regardless of who wins
Restrictions in place due to Covid-19 will not allow Sam Maguire to leave Croke Park on Saturday regardless of who wins the All-Ireland final between Dublin and Mayo that afternoon.
Dublin, of course, have been in possession of Sam for the past five years but Mayo are looking to bring the trophy back to the county for the first time in 69 years. Only they won't be able to take it away from headquarters even if they win on Saturday – for the time being at least.
It's a situation the Mayo captain, Aidan O'Shea, would like to see re-examined.
He said: “Obviously I had a bit of experience of it with the Connaught title. I was expecting it to be coming back with me afterwards but unfortunately that wasn't the case. I wasn't aware of that until the last moment that those restrictions were in place.
“Maybe it's a little bit over the top. For whatever team wins this weekend, the moment when you walk back into the dressing room with the cup is something special. I think the GAA could afford to allow that.
“At the same time I understand the circumstances that Covid-19 has placed upon us so it's justification on why that is the case, and fair enough. It's important to abide by and follow the restrictions.”
Fresh
O'Shea and a number of his team-mates have experience of playing Dublin in All-Ireland finals, but there are a number of new players in the Mayo set-up this year.
“A lot of those players wouldn't have played against the Dubs, so it's fresh for them and something different as well for the opposition,” O'Shea observed.
As for what he and his more experienced team-mates have learned from defeats to Dublin in the finals of 2013, 2016 (after a replay) and 2017, O'Shea they were 'hard lessons'.
He elaborated: “I think the consequence of a mistake is more significant (against Dublin) than it is against anyone else. You can't afford to make too many mistakes, structurally you need to stay pretty strong, whereas againt other teams there can probably be a little bit of variability on that and your risks don't have the same level of consequence.
“From our perspective we still want to be expressive and play our game, but you need to understand when you're executing that if you don't do it correctly there's a punishment at the end of it when you play Dublin.
“In saying that, the way we're playing is that kind of exciting, free-flowing game – and we'll continue to do that, because that's what suits our skill set best. That's probably what we've learned.”