Search Results for 'Mickey Harte'

When I woke last Sunday morning at 6.30am to find an inch of frozen snow covering the entire landscape around Charlestown I immediately thought there was no way I could travel to Killarney in these conditions, but I had to as I had the radio equipment in the boot of my car and without it no live broadcast of the much anticipated game could take place.

Keith Higgins got his tenure as the permanent Mayo captain off to a winning start in Killarney on Sunday, while he was happy to get the points the Ballyhaunis native isn’t getting carried away just yet.

After engaging in a shoot-out reminiscent of a hurling championship game last weekend against Kildare, James Horan’s Mayo go looking for their first points of the league on Sunday in Omagh against Tyrone. Horan, whose selection choices were stretched before the Kildare meeting because of injury and club commitments were stretched even further, with the injury picked up by Tom Parson’s not long after the start of the game, ruling him out for six weeks.

While most of the attention that is paid to the Mayo sideline is concentrated on what James Horan is doing and possibly thinking, one of his main lieutenants, Tom Prendergast, is as much an important cog in the Mayo wheel. Horan’s trusted ally since their days together with Ballintubber is another deep thinker on the game, but likes to keep things simple when talking about how Mayo have got to where they are. “It's like everything in life, you get out of it what you put into it,” he said last week.

The time has arrived again, another trip to Croker, our third semi-final in a row under James Horan, and it is time for all the talking to stop. It is game five of six as Mayo take on Tyrone in Croke Park on Sunday for a place in the All- Ireland final on September 22. I have one small fear ahead of the game, I’m sure it is only among the supporters and not the players, but a lot of people are dismissing Tyrone’s chances and are already wondering who Mayo will play in the final, I have never seen as many Mayo flags bought and as many green and red flags on cars and houses for a semi-final, we normally wait for a final for this to happen and that is a very dangerous way to be thinking before taking on the Red Hand. Confidence is one thing but cockiness is another. Have people forgotten that Tyrone have won three All- Irelands in the last 10 years and they completely demoralised far more superior Kerry teams than themselves in the not too distant past in finals. In the 2008 final, Kerry’s Tommy Walsh and Kieran Donaghy, the twin towers, were considered un-markable but Mickey Harte and the McMahon brothers found a way to do the job. Tyrone have an unbelievable capacity to frustrate you and get in your face, so to speak. They will annoy you and remind you of their success and Mayo’s failures in All-Ireland finals.

They have been there and done it three times in the past decade, while we are still waiting to do it for the first time in over 60 years, and on Sunday in Croke Park the Mayo juggernaught will collide with the Tyrone colossus for a place in the All Ireland final in four weeks’ time. Mayo have breezed through Connacht and swatted aside the challenge of the reining All Ireland champions en route to this showdown, while Tyrone have taken the scenic route that has taken them from defeat in May in Ballybofey, on to Tullamore, Roscommon, Newbridge, and Croke Park to get to the semi-final. James Horan named an unchanged side from the one that beat Donegal in the quarter-final on Thursday afternoon, with Tom Cunniffe getting the nod despite limping out of the Donegal game.

Now that the dust has settled on our fantastic victory over Donegal, it is time to brush it under the carpet and firmly set our sights on Tyrone in the All-Ireland semi final. The August Bank Holiday weekend was truly a brilliant weekend for Mayo football, with our minors also qualifying for the All-Ireland semi final with a rather facile victory over Leinster runners up Westmeath. It is a first minor and senior semi-final appearance at headquarters since 1999, the last time yours truly donned the green and red jersey when we lost to Munster champions Cork.

Hunger was the difference between Mayo and Donegal last Sunday according to many pundits; it was more like starvation. What more can you say, the best ever performance by a Mayo team in Croke Park and I don’t say that lightly. Donegal didn’t know what hit them, the way they dismantled the All-Ireland champions was so impressive it scared the living daylights out of everybody watching including the remaining three teams left in the competition. I was on Highland Radio (Donegal’s local station) the Wednesday evening before the quarter final and after telling it as it was, that I thought this Mayo team were in a really good place because of their build up, the competition for places and their ability to ease and not rush players back from injury unlike Donegal, and that Mayo were in serious physical shape, only to be jibed somewhat by James McHugh and Paul McGonigle (two former Donegal players) that “according to John Casey Donegal shouldn’t bother turning up on Sunday”. Well, maybe they should have listened.

Tyrone 0-12

While Galway were incredibly poor last Sunday and some of their defensive errors could be made into a coaching video on "what not to do in possession", you really had to admire how Mayo went about their business.