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The 3-19 to 0-13 scoreline from this year's National Football League final between Mayo and Kerry is a painful reminder of what Mayo face into on Sunday and what Kerry are capable of doing to a team if things are not near perfect when set up against them.

It’s never ordinary with Mayo. They won and are in the second round of the qualifiers, but it could very easily have been different if referee Barry Cassidy had decided to give Monaghan a penalty in injury time when Conor Lenonard looked to have been fouled after he intercepted a poor ball back to Lee Keegan, by Aidan O’Shea.

It's something familiar and yet something new that Mayo face into tomorrow afternoon in Hastings Insurance MacHale Park.

Last Sunday's way below par performance and subsequent defeat by our biggest Connacht rivals - Galway - made it a very bitter pill to swallow for the Mayo faithful who travelled to Hastings Insurance MacHale Park in huge numbers.

On paper and in the hours before the build-up, this game seemed to have it all. Two sides with a storied rivalry going back before the foundation of the state; both with much to prove after their last outings up in the big city, now meeting on a sun-splashed day that looked like July even if it still had the nip of Spring in the air when a cloud circled overhead and 25,000 partisan fanatics packed in to watch battle on the freshly laid turf in the old colosseum on MacHale Road.

Padraic Joyce managed Galway to a championship victory over Mayo for the first time on Sunday with a superb 1-14 to 0-16 victory in over their arch rivals in Castlebar.

There's nothing quite like a Mayo versus Galway championship encounter to whet the appetite for championship football. Rivalries have come and gone in other provinces, the likes of Meath and Dublin in Leinster and Cork and Kerry in Munster are no longer as appealing as they once were because of the dominance and stranglehold that Dublin and Kerry possess within their provinces.

The real stuff starts now. The league is a thing of the past, put away neatly in a box until early next year. it's championship time and while the Easter Eggs may still be lingering around the house ready to be finished off, Sunday is the start of a new main course and there are few tastier ones than Mayo and Galway in the championship.

Mayo go to Croke Park on Sunday, looking to claim a 13th National Football League title when they take on Kerry in the competition decider.

James Horan has made three changes to his starting teams for Mayo's clash with Kildare on Sunday afternoon in the National Football League.