He was disliked during his time as coach under Bonner, however I was calling for him to be given the Donegal job after Bonner left as I highly suspected he was not calling the shots in any way and that he was severely hamstrung in that regard. His record at club and county is huge, even if they didnât get over the line in the finals at intercounty level.
Horan is also an astute manager, but Iâd say heâd be unwilling to take the role at this time as Mayo collectively havnât anywhere near the talent he had at his disposal in previous stints. You need material to work with, and it just isnât there in all lines of the pitch.
Awful form by the county board. McStay was obviously well out of his depth with a county with all ireland ambitions, as well as trying to refuse to accept the new rule changes, as if they shouldnât be applied to his team. It sounds like he possibly got ill, as a result of the stress of the pressure and at the end of the day, he was brave enough to apply, and an individualâs health is more important than any sporting results.
On the other hand, it doesnât surprise me. Most of Mayo still living in the Bull McCabe era, psychologically.
I didnt mind McStay, but his inability to get the max out of Aidan over the past few years was baffling. Just feed the man the ball and get out of the way. Stop your faffing about.
Jonathan Wilson often talks about how the Ajax team of the 1970s benefitted from Rinus Michels who had built the team through a very disciplined and regimented system and atmosphere suddenly leaving after their first European Cup. He was replaced by Stefan Kovacs who was an inventive coach who was much more laid back and gave the players more power to let them express themselves more both in terms of style of play and in terms of dressing room culture. He unleashed their creativity. This led to a period where Ajax played their best ever football and they won two more European Cups. By the end however the whole thing was beginning to fall apart and after the 1973 European Cup did fall apart in a major way because the very freedom Kovacs had given the highly opinionated players meant it was inevitable it would fall apart.
Rochford to me was a bit like this after Horan and especially after the Holmes/Connelly debacle where the players felt disrespected. He was inventive and brave and he had Mayo playing the best football they ever played, but there were also moments of shambles where they could easily have been eliminated by much lesser teams. This didnât happen under Horan. Under Horan Mayo would usually pulverise lesser teams. By year 3 of Rochford, they were eliminated by a much lesser team and that was the end of him and the inklings coming out of Mayo were that the players werenât especially unhappy to see him go, perhaps because the discipline had declined compared to Horanâs time.
Horan then brought the discipline back and Mayo reached two more All-Ireland finals. Horan however failed badly in most of the four All-Irelands he reached. Mayo seemed afraid and doubtful in at least three of them. Rochford got three great performances out of Mayo in the three final games he reached.
In the recent games, when McStay was no longer involved, I think there was a somewhat similar dynamic. The players clearly preferred Rochford after presumably having become tired of McStay.
Stephen Rochford has also never won a Connaught championship as a manager.
Shur Lohan hasnât a Munster.
Rochford didnât have to compete with the second best team of all-time though.
Thatâs the paradox of him. Mayo were much better in the humdrum games under Horan than under Rochford, but when it came to the biggest games, against Dublin and Kerry Rochford was able to coax performances out of them that I donât think Horan could have done.
He might not be the man to build a team though. You often need a messianic bastard to build a team. Jimmy was and is a messianic bastard but heâs able to build discipline precisely because of that.
Connacht is a battlefield, more so than Ulster.
Mayo have hoovered up underage titles the last ten years in connacht. Much more so than Galway who have struggled massively. There must be the football equivalent of snipers in coopers on the way for Mayo.
Mayo have only won 1 Connacht U20 in the last 7 years though and that was this year. Theyâve won a few more minors alright recently but a much more unreliable grade for judging future success. They do have a couple of handy forwards coming through for a change in Darragh Beirne and Kobe McDonald but those two are unlikely to be difference makers in the next year or two anyway. They will take a while. Then again Matthew Thompson is 20 I think and is in the running for an All-Star.
Agree totally re Thompson. YPOTY is a near certainty and an all star is a realistic prospect if we go another round
Mayos problem is that they consistently produce the same type of player. Athletic, hardy square to square types but very very few assassins.
Andy Moran looked an absolute bollox to mark. Good balance, strong, and had that burst of pace, enough to burn his man and to get a shot off.
I tore Des Cahill a new arse on this on twitter, then deleted the fucking thing. Saying what the fuck is he on about. Had about 20 likes and everything in about 15 mins. Had enough to deal with during the day so wasnât going through the hassle. Load of bollocks over little.
Maybe these lads know something we donât,is mcstay is in bad shape if so that statement could be viewed in bad taste.
Something must be up if he had too stand down already. County board could use that. Iâm assuming being that you have all the media heads giving out, theyâd of course know something seems McStay is a media head himself. But sure look, not like heâs after losing his job and his livelihood either.
If he saw a priest hed go over and kiss him.
And he wants big money as well.
Thatâs army cadets for you
Reports coming in that Enoch Burke will fill the famed Caroline Currid role as Mayo launch yet another search for Sam in 2026. Heâll bring vision, durability, resilience, dourness and a never say die attitude. âI wonât back downâ the old Tom Perry song to be the rallying anthem.