Search Results for 'Colm Boyle'

There’s nothing won on the last day of January of note, but Mayo will hope that this will be the worst day they have this year as Cork ran riot on Leeside. Every game is different and Mayo came into it shorn of a number of key men that will surely be big players later on this year, but it still must be taken on its merits as a contest over 70 minutes and in this contest Mayo were so far second best that they game was never a contest from as early as the 20th minute when Cork put themselves three points clear.

When the history books on Stephen Rochford’s tenure in charge of Mayo are written, this game will be a brief footnote in the overall analysis of his term as Mayo senior manager, but it will be a winning footnote. He started just one third of the side that last were in competitive action for Mayo last September and gave debuts to a handful of hopefuls, while a number of probables and returning faces were also given starts in the first game of the 2016 adventure.

Now that the dust has settled and Mayo’s 2015 attempt to win back the Sam Maguire cup for the first time since 1951 came to a very disappointing end, I was somewhat amazed at the way the media and general public analysed the situation. You have to be thick skinned to be a manager of a senior inter-county team; I know I will never be. The knives are most certainly out. Everybody bar the team’s kit man has had some level of blame directed towards them.

Liam Gallagher once described a gig he played in Slane Castle as biblical, what went in Croke Park last Sunday was nothing short of the same. It was the most anticipated All-Ireland semi final in living memory and it certainly did not disappoint. I arrived early to do a piece with Radio One outside the Croke Park Hotel alongside former Hill 16 favourite Barney Rock and the place was buzzing at 12.30pm. I ran into a few former team mates, namely David Heaney, David Brady, and Kevin O'Neill who had just flown in from the USA for the game. I also had a chat with current Kerry minor and former All-Ireland winning senior manager Jack O'Connor who was rightly cock a hoop about Mayo’s chances. He told myself and Brady that he was coming up to Mayo for a week after they eventually win Sam which he said could be in a few weeks time. I hope he’s right.

It was done and dusted, Mayo were going home and the dream looked to have died for another year when Jack McCaffrey put the ball over the bar to put Dublin 2-12 to 0-11 clear with 60.45 gone on the clock. Mayo brought in Alan Freeman just after the white flag had been raised.

Ten minutes from time Jack McCaffery swung the ball over the bar and the Hill was in full voice as Dublin went seven points clear and Mayo were hanging on looking for a punchers chance of resurrecting their interest in this years All Ireland senior championship. But they dug in and fought it out to the not so bitter end. Eight minutes from time Andy Moran fired over a nice score from play, a minute later Keith Higgins side stepped his way to a point and the gap was closing in.

He is one of the hardest, toughest, defenders you are likely to come across on the field of play, the kind of guy who puts his head in where it hurts, without consideration for his own wellbeing in the pursuit of victory. His hard hits are legendary, with the shoulder he put in on Damien Comer in last year's Connacht championship meeting between Mayo and Galway being felt right back up to the rafters in the stand in MacHale Park. But when you meet Colm Boyle off the field, he is one of the nicest fellows you could meet. Boyle has become a regular of the Mayo senior team press events and he is always courteous with his time and willing to ask whatever questions are put to him. For a guy who thought six year ago his inter-county career might have been over, he has become one of the backbones of Mayo success over the last half a decade.

This Sunday’s All-Ireland semi-final clash between 2013 All-Ireland champions Dublin, and the team they defeated by a single point in that final, Mayo, has the entire country anticipating a humdinger of a game. Croke Park itself is a total sell-out, so there will be 82,000 plus a few stragglers at the game itself, and about 750,000 viewers tuning in on TV.

Traditionally, once the starting 15 was announced all talk would move towards the various match-ups that would occur on the field. But even with Mayo announcing their starting 15 on Wednesday night for Sunday's big game, most of the talk was shifted towards "is that how they will actually line out". Since Pat Holmes and Noel Connelly threw the curve ball of dropping Barry Moran into the starting 15 for Mayo's win over Donegal in the quarter final win over the Ulster men, the chances of their doing the same for Dublin became a more real possability.

This Sunday’s All-Ireland semi-final clash between 2013 All-Ireland champions Dublin and the team they defeated by a single point in that final, Mayo, has the entire country anticipating a humdinger of a game.