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The Mayo football championship kicked into life in sweltering Mediterranean like conditions last weekend. Defending champions Castlebar Mitchels showed no ill effects from their All-Ireland final nightmare two months ago when they easily accounted for Crossmolina Deel Rovers despite fielding just over half of the team that started in that All Ireland final.

Getting relegated out of the second tier of the senior inter-county hurling championship would never have been part of the plan for Mayo, but that was what happened last year when a disappointing season ended with them dropping down into the third tier competition for the first time since the new championship gradings were introduced back in 2005. Up until this demotion Mayo had operated in the Christy Ring Cup and held their own for the most part with the sides in that competition.

The Mayo senior hurlers will take on Armagh in the second round of the Nicky Rackard Cup tomorrow afternoon in Ballina when they take on Armagh, as they look to book a spot in the semi-final of the competition. Last weekend Mayo opened up their Rackard account with a 4-19 to 0-17 win over Tyrone, but it was very hard fought encounter, as manager JP Coen explained. "It was just bad play and a bit of complacency. We hadn't played a competitive game in a good while, probably the journey too didn't help — it's a lot further than you'd think for a bus journey — that coupled with a small bit of rustiness and it took us a while to get going. In fairness to Tyrone, they came at us at a good tempo and they did very well. While we might have looked to be playing badly, we had a few bad wides that could have had us in front at the break, but we found our range in the second half and took it from there."

Ten years ago Mayo met Cork in the All Ireland u21 final in Ennis, and tomorrow afternoon both sides will meet once more in the same venue for the Clarke Cup at stake yet again. Mayo come into the final on the back of their first provincial title since 2009 and a heroic come from behind win late on against Dublin in the semi-final in Tullamore a fortnight ago.

For those of you who have ever been to Old Trafford to watch Man Utd I am sure you are familiar with the song about “never dying” in honour of the club’s resurrection after the tragic Munich Air disaster. I know there has not been such a tragedy in Mayo football terms but such a song would be very appropriate about Michael Solan’s Mayo u21 team. They never give up. They never die.

The Mayo senior hurlers got their National League season off to a winning start last Sunday, when they saw off Donegal in MacHale Park in round one of the league. This year sees Mayo drop down to the Nicky Rackard Cup for their championship campaign in the summer time and we caught up with Mayo senior hurling manager JP Coen during the week to look ahead to the season and what he expects from his charges.

The Connacht GAA Centre of Excellence is going to be a hive of activity this weekend with the semi-finals in both the Mayo GAA u21A for the first time and u21C for a second time down for decision. In the premier grade of the competition, Aghamore and Kiltimagh will meet in the first semi-final on Saturday at 5pm, with the second semi-final between Moy Davitts and Claremorris taking place on Sunday at noon.

It was always going to be a tough ask for Aghamore to turn over the 2013 champions in this game, they needed to keep things tight and tidy at the back and try and build up a lead they could hold on to going down the home stretch and hope that it would have triggered some doubts in the Mitchels minds.