Mayo GAA Discussion Thread

seligehgit wrote: »

Anybody worried about Donal Vaughan's ability to hold the centre/lack of pace?

Yes, and particularly his habit of bombing up field, giving the ball away and leaving a huge hold in our back line. He is an inter county standard player alright but he needs to tweak his game for the position he plays. At the moment, unfortunately, there is a James Nallen/Pearce Hanley sized hole in the middle of our back line. I'm not sure the other current option - Cunniffe - is the man to fill it either.

Fowler87 wrote: »

Good article with a few interesting stats on Mayo over the league campaign and last year Championship..

http://www.livegaelic.com/features/mayos-season-so-far-breaking-down-the-stats/

Worrying that our possession and scoring averages are down somewhat during the league campaign but Id say with rotation of players along with the lesser nature of league football in comparison to the championship has a big say in that. Mad that we were nearly as good against Donegal as we were versus Dublin in the semi final last year too. As they say, goals win matches

EDIT: Another standout stat is COC poor return % from play. Its actually similar enough to the likes of B.Moran and D.Vaughan. Whether this switch to the centre will get more from him as playmaker role remains to be seen but Cillian will have to improve his shooting a lot from play even though he's one of the best around at taking frees.

Dontfoul is a terrific blog, anyone who doesn't know it should it get on it.

I've made my own contribution here if anyone wants a look, pretty much the pitfalls ahead for Mayo:

http://www.livegaelic.com/features/connacht-championship-state-of-play/

Fowler87 wrote: »

Nice one Keane il take a read of it at lunchtime. Only came across the site recently but some good content on it. Your right on that blog, some effort made, equivalent to the opta stats in the soccer.

Thanks man, appreciate the feedback. Don't hesitate to drop me a line with any suggestions or whatnot.

Yeah dontfoul is terrific. He's just a regular guy who does it in his spare time for the hell of it as well. It's bananas how little there is in terms of stats analysis for GAA. The only guy doing it to any decent level professionally that I can see is Rob Carroll who works with Kildare. I got my hands on one of his match reports a few weeks ago and it's very interesting stuff but even the simple stuff dontfoul does is extremely telling about how teams ought to attack and defend.

You probably already know of Emmet Ryan's blog "Action 81". He does the best tactical pre- and post-match analysis of GAA in the country, bar none.

tacofries wrote: »

Expecting a good match tomorrow. Hope its a point for point game

It should be a tight enough match. You would expect mayo to come out on top though

MaroonAndGreen wrote: »

Rumors that Coen wont be starting and that Dillon will take his place!

Really think Galway have a chance, but hoping Mayo pull out what will probably have to be their biggest performance in the Connaught Championship under James Horan.

Maigh Eo Abu!

If that happens O Connor will go into the corner and dillon n half forward line

Will there be tickets at Pearse Stadium tomorrow? It will hardly be full will it?

blowitupref wrote: »

Ticket van should be outside the ground. 18,000 is the expected crowd.

Cheers I must get up there early to be sure

Our year...

id say they will be under pressure to have it on with it being on tv

Always_Running wrote: »

It's one of the worst pitches in Connacht i'd say after all todays rain the game in is the balance.

Jaysis I thought it was an unreal surface the last time I walked on it. Thought was a lot better than Castlebar but saying that, with all this rain it wont be great tomorrow especially for the Senior game

They really need to think about removing the Connacht junior final from the bill if the pitch is borderline because it'll be tore to shreds no matter how good a field it is by the time the senior game starts.