Mayo senior football team manager Kevin McStay. Photo by Daire Brennan/Sportsfile
By Cian O’Connell
Mayo manager Kevin McStay was bitterly disappointed that his team didn’t triumph following a frenetic finish in the Connacht SFC Final against Galway at Pearse Stadium.
The green and red led by two points in additional time, but Galway kicked three late points to seal victory.
Mayo had assumed a healthy position at various stages in the second half, but couldn’t put a gritty Galway outfit away. “We thought we nearly had it when we were at three, but we could not get it to four so the game was always alive,” McStay reflected.
“There was no sense that we had it won or anything, but we thought we would get it over the line and didn’t.
“You have to commend Galway for staying at it; they were staring down defeat too and they were able to get it down the field got a few frees and keep themselves in contention and once there was only a point or two in it there was always a feeling it was there to be won.
“Yeah, it is disappointing, we were mad to win it, I hope ye all understand now there was no one lining up easy groups or difficult groups when you see the stuff that was going on there, both teams were committed to winning the Nestor Cup, but it has eluded us now.”
Ultimately, McStay felt Mayo didn’t sustain their performance levels enough throughout the match. “We were patchy, we never got a flow going, we never got to a place where we were comfortable in the game,” was McStay’s assessment.
“We were good for 10 minutes and then left them back into it, instead of tapping out the lead. That would be our biggest disappointment because really wanted to give an even performance, we wanted a strong bench to come in and try to give us a lift and equally Galway had their strong bench.
“That was the way it was always going to finish out, the last 15/20 which bench made the biggest impact, and Galway got a fair tune out of their one.”
Not winning the provincial title is a setback according to McStay. “We had our hearts set on it,” he remarked.
“It's something we wanted to do as a group. It would have left us having won a lot of the stuff that's on offer to us, if we could have won the Connacht Championship, just this group over the last 18 months or so, but it wasn't to be.
“We know from last year when we played Louth and Cork, in this kind of linear analysis that people do, 'two points, easy game'. It doesn't work out like that. We have to look at who we're playing and every game will be played on its merits.
“There's one away from home, which is going to be tricky. There's one in a neutral venue and that's going to be tricky. And I have no doubt that our game at home will be a tricky one.
“The top 16 teams in the country are all well coached and well put together, so there's going to be nothing simple for anybody. But we'll think about that tomorrow. We thought only about Galway and ourselves."