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After a year's break, it is back to the traditional tomorrow afternoon in Tooreen when the Blue Devils go toe-to-toe with with near neighbours Ballyhaunis in the Mayo Senior Hurling Championship final.

There has been a massive turn around in the fortunes of the Mayo hurlers in the past few months.

The biting cold and soaking rain probably stopped Tooreen’s most famous alleged visitor from stopping by again, but it didn’t dissuade the hurling faithful of Mayo from making their way to Adrian Freeman Park on Saturday afternoon for the latest instalment of this very local rivalry.

The Mayo senior hurlers retained their place in the Christy Ring Cup for 2018 thanks to a ten point win over Roscommon in Carrick-on-Shannon on Saturday night. Mayo’s victory was spearheaded by ace marksman Kenny Feeney who finished up with eleven points over the 70 minutes. Having been relegated to the third tier of the championship by their opponents two years ago, this victory will have been all the sweeter for JP Coen’s men.

Hurling is a game of inches, an inch this way and that way can decide the outcome of a game, be it from a shot for a score or a ball that slips just past a hand and there was just a matter of a few inches between Mayo and Kildare on the scoreboard and the field in this Christy Ring Cup first round clash.

It has been a busy few weeks for the Ballyhaunis hurlers and it is about to get busier again. On Sunday, they face into their fourth game in 14 days, having draw the Mayo Senior Hurling Championship final with Tooreen last Sunday week, before they eventually got the better of them in another Titanic encounter in Ballyhaunis last Sunday by just three points. They followed that up on Wednesday evening with a 1-12 to 0-9 win over Roscommon champions Oran in the semifinal of the Connacht Intermediate Championship in the Connacht GAA Centre of Excellence and now on this coming Sunday, they face Galway champions Ahascragh-Fohenagh in the final of that competition at 2pm in Athleague.

Mayo make the trip to the Athletic Grounds in Armagh today to take on the Orchard County in what is a must win game for JP Coen’s men. After winning three out of three in their opening games in the league this year, Mayo slipped into third place in the table and out of the placings for a spot in the league final and a crack at promotion to Division 2A for next year after their disappointing loss to Wicklow last weekend in Castlebar.

An experimental Mayo side got their Connacht GAA Senior Hurling League campaign off to a winning start with this twelve point win over an NUIG side in the Connacht GAA Centre in Bekan on Monday night.