Search Results for 'John Maughan'

Just over six months since Mayo last played a senior inter-county game the road is opening up in front of them for another year. On Sunday in Ballinamore in Leitrim the newest version of the Mayo senior team will take to the field under the guidance of James Horan for the first time. Since his appointment at the end of September, Horan has only been able to run his eye over his new charges a handful of times, the last time last weekend in a series of inter-squad challenge games and previous to that in a number of trial games in November.

The winter training ban for inter-county footballers and hurlers is officially over, even though some counties did not seem to know it was in place in the first instance; and the first bit of competitive action of 2011 in Connacht kicks off this weekend with the start of the FBD league.

Former Mayo manager John Maughan ruled himself out of the running for the vacant Mayo senior managers job late on Thursday evening. The Crossmolina native who three times guided Mayo the All Ireland senior final confirmed to the Mayo Advertiser that he would not be going forward to the interview stage of the process, he told the Advertiser that he was very interest in the job, but following a discussion with chairman of the county board on Thursday he decided not to pursue his interest in the position any further.

First there were five, now there are seven, in the hat to become the next Mayo senior football manager. Last weekend Mayo county secretary Seán Feeney confirmed to the Mayo Advertiser that the county board had received expressions of interest in the role from two outsiders in the position. Last Monday at a county board meeting those two outsiders were revealed to be former Dublin managers Tommy Carr and Tommy Lyons. Carr recently finished up a stint as Cavan manager, having previously managed Roscommon as well as Dublin. Lyons has also previously managed Offaly, winning a Leinster title in 1997, before taking over Dublin. Both men’s entry into the ring has heated up the competition for the role. But as John Maughan reveals in his exclusive Mayo Advertiser column this week, one other former inter-county manager would have liked to express his interest in the role, but didn’t because of distance he lives from Mayo.

The Mayo county board have received a number of expressions of interest in the position of Mayo senior football manager other than from those who where already in the public domain, the Mayo Advertiser has learned.

The curtain came down on Mayo’s involvement in the All Ireland series last Sunday as Tony Duffy’s brave and battling minors bowed out in the All Ireland semi-final. But 62 days on from Pearse Park in Longford and their senior counterparts’ exit from the championship in the first round of the qualifiers, how far has the shaping of the future of Mayo football gone since just after 9.30pm in the underbelly of the stand in Pearse Park, when John O’Mahony announced that he was standing aside after four years?

Ballintubber v Ballina

There had been two nominations made by clubs to fill the role of Mayo senior football manager at the time that this paper went to print on Thursday evening.

There was plenty of anticipation in the Café Bar of the Royal Theatre last Tuesday night as the winners and losers of the senior, intermediate, and junior championship group stages gathered to find out their fates for the last weekend in August. Only those sides in the senior and intermediate championship which finished in the no-man’s-land of third place in their group had no interest in the draw, with quarter final and relegation pairings to be decided by the luck of draw from the hat (or Pyrex glass bowl in this case). With the draw about to begin, the unmistakable theme tune from the 1980s classic TV show and 2010 summer blockbuster flop The A-Team pierced the ears of those in attendance, but the errant ringing phone was quickly silenced as there was important business to be taken care of.

So with seven of the eight quarter finalists already known, the last place in the knock out stages of the Royal Theatre senior football championship will be known by Saturday night when Breaffy host West Mayo in the final group game of the competition.