Roscommon's Conor Mulry and Mayo's David Kenny with a hand each on the Nickey Rackard Cup. Photo by Seb Daly/Sportsfile
By Paul Keane
Conor Mulry is cautiously optimistic.
He and Roscommon will certainly head to Croke Park for the Nickey Rackard Cup final as underdogs in the eyes of most neutrals but there is opportunity in that low profile. Who doesn't love being an underdog?
"We're hopeful I would say, not confident, we know that anything can happen on the day so we're hoping for the best," said joint captain Mulry.
The last time they played Mayo, in their opening group game, Roscommon lost by seven points. Prior to that, they met in the National League and Mayo won by 3-25 to 1-12.
Mayo went on to win the Division 3 final, beating a London side who will compete in the Christy Ring Cup final, a grade above the Rackard competition.
So the challenge for Roscommon is clear.
"Mayo have won the league and haven't lost a Championship game so they're pretty much unbeaten all year," acknowledged Roscommon attacker Mulry. "So yeah, they're looking very strong."
But so are Roscommon who, after a loss and a draw in their opening two group games, came roaring back with big wins over Armagh, Fermanagh and Louth to reach the final. Against Fermanagh and Louth they struck eight goals, four each day.
Sean Canning from the Padraig Pearses club accounted for three of those goals against Louth and hit the net in the previous two rounds too. Mulry has been weighing in with scores as well in a Roscommon attack that has the potential to catch fire on the perfect sod.
For Mulry, the really important thing is that Roscommon deliver a consistent display for the duration.
"If you go back to that first round game against Mayo, our second-half performance is something that we'd really need to improve on," said the Four Roads man. "We probably went into a lull for about 20 minutes. It killed us in the end, to tell you the truth. I think we need to get rid of any of those sorts of lulls, if we can at all."
Roscommon were last in the final in 2022, when they lost out to Tyrone. Mulry missed the campaign with a serious knee injury.
"There's not that many lads left from then," he said. "We'd have a large turnover of players. Off the top of my head, we might only have six or seven left maybe. A good few lads have retired since and we've gone through a bit of a rebuild with a lot of young lads coming on board.
"A lot of those young lads actually played at Croke Park last year in the U-20 B final. So a lot of them have Croke Park experience which should hopefully stand to them.
"I actually think, someone told me during the week, that the Hyde in Roscommon and Croke Park are nearly a carbon copy, size-wise. So hopefully it will suit us that way because we do enjoy playing on the Hyde, a big open space."
