Search Results for 'Matthew Ruane'

All 16 runners and riders in this year's Mayo Senior Football Championship have been waiting for this weekend to arrive for a while now. Saturday will see a full slate of action taking place all over the county, with Ballintubber the defending champions the side to beat again this year.

With our league success still digesting, the attention now turns to preparing for an assault on the Connacht championship and then hopefully the All-Ireland series.

Days like this don’t come around too often and when they do it is something to be savoured and the thousands of Mayo supporters who made yet another pilgrimage to Croke Park made drank up every moment of this one after the final whistle.

With ten minutes to go last Sunday, James Horan introduced James Carr into the action, making the Ardagh man the 34th player to get game time during the league for Mayo this season.

Heading to Croke Park to face Kerry used to be the thing that would fill Mayo supporters with a sense of dread in their stomachs - but since James Horan's first stint in charge of the Mayo team, things have swung in Mayo's favour.

Mayo knew that things had to go in their favour elsewhere if they were to make next Sunday’s league final – but they still had to take care of business themselves to make sure they were still in with a shout of a place in the final.

Before Saturday's league clash with Kerry, James Horan told RTE sport that he was looking for improvements on his team's performances against Galway and Dublin; that he wasn't looking for a “response” to the poor displays, just improvements on the positives from the previous two outings.

Making the league final or not will not make or break Mayo's season, but getting back to the competition's final for the first time since 2012 will be a nice bonus for James Horan, as he ramps up preparations for the championship summer ahead.

Mayo made the long trek home from Tralee with two vital league points in the bag thanks to a hard working performance against the up to then unbeaten Kerry men.

It was misery all round for Mayo GAA as our senior men and ladies suffered a double defeat for the second week in a row.