Mayo not quite out of relegation trouble just yet

by John Melvin

THE win over Kerry, which was Mayo’s second of this year’s Allianz National Football League, adding to their victory over Tyrone and the point garnered against Armagh, puts Kevin McStay’s team in a strong position to secure their Division 1 status with two games remaining.

However, it doesn’t guarantee that status in a league that has seen many twists and turns, some of the new rules certainly favouring teams who can kick two-pointers with a lot more ease than others, including Mayo. Double-figure leads at half-time are no guarantee that a team will win their game.

It has been a league fraught with controversy yet laced with excitement and drama, as we saw in the most recent encounter between Mayo and Kerry and Galway and Tyrone. As the fella said, 'Sure where would you get it?'

The proposed new rules have been embraced by supporters in general given the high level of complaints in relation to the poor entertainment value many games provided previously, mainly though the dreaded blanket defence which was smothering the game, while it was also becoming clear that many of the skills associated with the sport have been diminishing, in some cases even dying.

I do believe the new rules have gone some many to correcting those criticism, particularly in the area of high fielding and kicking for scores, but clearly there are a few of the new proposals that need to be addressed, if not binned entirely, the roving goalie becoming something of a menace and the kick-out clock a disaster

It was always a big ask for the Football Review Committee (FRC) to come up with such radical proposals and please everybody, but managers, referees and, most importantly, players have indicated that a few of the new rules need to be altered.

Some tweaks have been made and we could see further changes before the rules are fully adopted ahead of the championship, referees in particularly needing more help with the onerous responsibility they have been landed with.

That is a discussion for another day. Of immediate concern to Mayo and indeed to a number of teams in Division 1 is securing their safety in the top flight for another season, and Kevin McStay's charges are still not quite out of the woods, despite garnering five points – a laudable achievement given their tardy start to the league.

Mayo travel to Celtic Park today to face a familiar foe – Derry – who won the Division 1 title last year, and went on to send Mayo crashing out of the championship in a preliminary quarterfinal, which was decided by a penalty shootout.

It was a strange championship system that allowed a team (Derry) to lose three games and yet make the quarterfinal of the All-Ireland Championship. That format will be changing in 2026.

Their preliminary quarterfinal in Hastings Insurance MacHale Park was a game that Mayo should have won in normal time and in extra-time, when they went three points up, but once again there was a failure to close out a game they had the winning of, a feature which was so common last season.

McStay has already rectified that mental problem in the two games they won this year (Tyrone and Kerry) by showing a lot of grit and composure under pressure, and they will need all of that and more to deny Derry, whose backs are very much against the wall with a just one point from their five games so far as they balance precariously on the precipice of making the drop.

Given the absence of key players such as Aidan O’Shea and Jordan Flynn in particular for their opening two games, it was no great surprise to see Mayo lose to Dublin and Galway.

However, on the credit side for McStay is the response his team produced, particularly against Tyrone and more recently Kerry, while that draw with Armagh was without doubt a huge turning point in terms of getting some badly-needed self-belief into a team that didn’t seem to be adapting so well to the new rules.

It is fair to say we have seen some great moments at times, the arrival of Breaffy man Davitt Neary certainly adding pace and penetration to the attack.

Ryan O’Donoghue’s performance against Kerry will certainly last long in the memory, while the physical presence of Aidan O’Shea brings to Mayo’s game was crucial in that win over Kerry, as was the work of Mattie Ruane around the middle, while the role played by Jack Carney would suggest this is where he performs at his optimum.

Donnacha McHugh’s display against Kerry will also boost his confidence in that full-back position, while David McBrien and Enda Hession two other defenders who continue to make an impression, particularly in going forward.

But we know Mayo can hit hot and cold days, and we are not deluding ourselves to suggest they are not without weaknesses – but they are making progress.

They face a huge test this Sunday against Derry, a team whose physicality will pose the biggest challenge, but I have a feeling Mayo, who seem to have banished those first-half blues, will put it up to them. I expect Mayo could pull a point from this game, and that would most likely be enough to secure their status.

A defeat could leave them facing Donegal at home in Hastings Insurance MacHale Park needing a win or possibly a draw to avoid demotion, but I don’t think it will come to that.