Round-up: Electric Ireland Connacht MFC action

Electric Ireland Connacht MFC

Roscommon 2-17 Mayo 0-13

Galway 0-19 Sligo 1-12

Just like their successful 2025 campaign, Roscommon’s minor footballers have qualified for the Electric Ireland Connacht MFC final with a game still to play after they produced the performance of this championship so far to account for Mayo at Hastings Insurance MacHale Park.

Seamie Carthy with 0-6, Jayden Jennings with 0-5 and wing back Enda Browne with two points in a wonderful all-round performance led the way for Shane Moran’s Rossies, who got out to a dream start when Cathal Nerney took advantage of a spill in the Mayo goalmouth to palm in an early goal.

That score still separated the sides at half-time, with Charlie Fallon and Fiachra Ó Cinnseala landing two good scores each for Mayo in the opening half hour.

Roscommon hit for home in style after the turnaround, just as they did last week against Galway with a significant improvement from one half to the next.

Jennings and Carthy fired over two-pointers, while Carthy (2) and Browne added white flags in a run of 0-7 without reply.

Any lingering doubt about the result was removed with five minutes to play when Carthy bore down on goal, Rowan McLoughlin did well to save the Roscommon Gaels’ man’s shot, but Nerney was again on hand to send the rebound to the net.

Galway didn’t need goals to pick up their second win of the campaign, though Sligo were very competitive for long stretches, only to be undone by playing 20 minutes of their fixture at Tuam Stadium with 14 players.

Sligo burst into the game with an early point from Ryan Lang, fisted over the bar from the St. Molaise Gaels player just when it looked as if it was opening up for a shot on Evan Burke in the Galway goal.

Lang added two more points while Ryan Healy shot two excellent scores as Sligo pushed 0-6 to 0-3 in front despite playing into a relatively mild breeze at Tuam Stadium, only to lose their momentum when they picked up a black card approaching half-time.

Adam Healy’s point made it 0-7 to 0-5 at half-time, and that was still the margin when Aodhán Hannon split the uprights from out on the right wing for the Yeats County four minutes into the second half.

A perfectly struck two-point free off the deck from Burke drew Galway level and that was the start of a real spell of Galway dominance. Wing-backs Ryan Connolly and Keelan Moran were both superb in this phase of the game, adding scores and generally putting Galway on the front foot with strong driving runs through the middle third of the field, and it fell to Aaron Hanrahan to complete a run of 0-7 unanswered for the home side.

The game was put right back in the melting pot when Nathan McLoughlin robbed a Galway defender and played in Lang for a clinical finish, leaving just a point between the sides at the start of the final quarter, but a second yellow card for Seán Óg McDonagh made life much easier for the Tribesmen in moving the ball around the pitch and a second orange flag, again from a Burke free, pushed Galway over the finish line.