By John Harrington

In other years Mayo’s relegation from Division 1 of the Allianz Football League would have prompted much soul-searching in the playing group and no little weeping and gnashing of teeth amongst the supporters.

2020 is no average year, though, and Cillian O’Connor has already moved on from the fact and consequences of Sunday’s defeat to Tyrone.

When you’re playing a Connacht Championship quarter-final against Leitrim a week later, there’s little to be gained from dwelling on League disappointment.

Instead, he’s very much taking a glass half full approach to the upcoming campaign because the energy in a new-look Mayo panel is so good.

“It's been the strongest turnover or changes of new blood in a few years,” O’Connor told GAA.ie

“It's been brilliant. It's great when you see fresh, new faces stepping up. It's the same with every team, they step in for a game or they come on as a sub and they show real potential and suddenly they clean someone in an 'A' versus 'B'.

“You know in the dressing-room or in training that something is happening here. That guy is not just an impact sub or one for the future, he's one for now. I think players are the first ones to know when that starts happening.

“Then you've got the dynamic of the older players coming back and wondering am I being rested now or have I lost my place? That healthy competition is brilliant and it's good craic as well for the squad.”

O’Connor is still surely the first name inked on James Horan’s team-sheet regardless of the enhanced competition in the panel, but he doesn’t see it that way.

He regretfully agreed with his physios it wasn’t a good idea to risk a bruised quad muscle in Sunday’s defeat to Tyrone with the match against Leitrim just around the corner, but you can tell it frustrated him not to have another opportunity to lay down a marker ahead of the Championship.

“It was just a little bang on the quad and I was hoping to play against Tyrone, even after the Galway game. I had a bit of a run around on Saturday the day before just to clear it and it just wasn't 100 per cent right.

“So then you have to toss it up, do I play or do I put myself forward to play and take a risk of aggravating something or do I rest and recover? I just went with the medical team and that was the call so it was a bit disappointing.

“You're only back one game and you're missing the next one so it was annoying. Touch wood, it's nothing serious.

“I'd say if it was an old season you would have chanced it on Sunday and even if it flares up into a three or four week injury I'd probably be okay for the next one or whatever. I'll take a week off training and I'll have time to recover.

“I was thinking if I'm not training Tuesday/Thursday this week I'm going to be out of the picture and some young lad will play well. So I needed to be 100 per cent for this week.

“Having said that, if I was fit to play the game I definitely would have played. That was the call that was made. The season is so strange now that a bad dead leg or a roll of an ankle you could miss the season.

“It's the same for everybody, it's interesting.”

Encouragingly for Mayo supporters, O’Connor looked sharp in Mayo’s highly impressive 3-23 to 0-17 Allianz Football League victory over Galway a couple of weeks ago when he kicked 10 points, two of them from play.

The entire forward line played with an eye-pleasing cohesion and cutting edge. Aidan O’Shea caused wreck on the edge of the square, Conor Loftus produced one of his most mature displays yet in a Mayo jersey, and newcomers Mark Moran and Tommy Conroy added a real dash of flair and freshness.

The ambition and imagination the team performed with was very much in the spirit of how forwards coach Ciaran McDonald played the game in his own day, and O’Connor admits it’s been a real pleasure working with the Mayo legend since he joined James Horan’s backroom team.

“I would have never worked with him before this,” says O’Connor. “This year has been brilliant, just on a personal level to build a relationship there and get to know him and talk about his experiences over the years and what he's learned from playing with Mayo and his club.

“It's been great in the training sessions having a mind like that designing drills or designing different scenarios in games and just trying to see the game the way he sees it.

“Having another voice sticking up for forwards and that's always trying to kick the ball and be progressive, it's been good. I suppose it's just another voice for the forwards.

“He knows how we want to receive the ball, he knows how we want to play heads up attacking football. In fairness, the rest of the management team do as well, but it's been great to have something bounce off in one on one conversations as well after training to see if he has any kind of ideas or if you have issues he's very sound that way.”

If Mayo can keep playing with the sort of zest they did against Galway then they’ll be real genuine challengers in a knock-out championship you would think would suit the mentality of the team.

They’ve had no shortage of do or die battles in knock-out championship matches in recent years so this year’s format should be grist to their mill.

“Yeah there is definitely an element of that over the few years where we've had our backs to the wall and we've had to pull something out, often because of our own doing really,” says O’Connor.

“There's probably been a bit too many do or die games early in the summer for our liking. But you said it there, there's players in the group over the last few years who've had to pull big performances out at key stages in the summer and have done that.

“So we'd have no fear of the knockout championship, we've had to live on the edge there a few times over the years. You do learn to enjoy that in a weird way.

“You get the butterflies a bit more maybe the day before and you know the consequence of defeat here is lights out. So there is this weird enjoyment in that as well.

“If we're in that position later in the year or now there will be lads who'll be relishing that kind of edginess. So that'll be enjoyable and you just hope that the young guys come in and have the same appetite for really going after it.”

O’Connor’s own excitement about the upcoming championship is palpable.

You’re very much left with the impression of a sportsman who can’t wait to experience the adrenalin surge playing the game he loves when the stakes are at their highest and at a time when sport feels more important than ever.

“100% absolutely, that's it in a nutshell,” says O’Connor. “If there's something that the last few weeks and months have kind of shown us is that we probably take the buzz for granted at times because there's always another game, at least you feel that way.

“Then when it's pulled away from you, you do have a bit of a withdrawal symptoms. I need that bit of rush, that bit of pressure, I want that expectation on me.

“So it's helped us I think to appreciate that, you mention adrenaline, there's not many people who'll get that this weekend and we're one of the lucky few so above all else before winning and losing comes into it, we get to put on a jersey, know that there's hundred of thousands around the world listening or watching, waiting and expecting, and you get to be one of the guys in the arena.

“That's a buzz yeah.”