Crisis deepens as footballers take pounding in Tuam

Mayo 2-14Galway 0-12

FRANK FARRAGHERat Tuam

A SEASON that always had a ‘cause for concern’ label attached to it for Galway is fast spiralling into unhindered free fall, judging by the scale of this humiliating National League defeat at the hands of the old foe at Tuam Stadium on Sunday.

In the end, Galway were somewhat fortunate not to have suffered a heavier defeat, as at different stages of the second half, they trailed by 11 or 12 point margins — with a good 15 minutes left, there was a steady trickle of home supporters heading for the exit gates.

The scoreboard deficit at the end though was largely a matter of cosmetics with the competitive lifeblood gone from this encounter 13 minutes into the second half when impressive Mayo corner forward Jason Doherty hammered home his second goal.

It was all pretty sad, and silent too, for the Galway faithful in the crowd of about 3,500 as they watched Mayo canter rather leisurely to a distance victory without ever having to pull out the whip.

Galway are in a very tough place at the moment, missing a clutch of key players, but they are also a side drained of even a morsel of confidence. Continuous beatings take their toll and a Mayo humiliation ‘in front of your own’ at Tuam Stadium is probably as bad as it gets.

The players have put in a big effort since the first days of January but so far Tomás Ó Flatharta hasn’t ‘cut it’ in the Galway job. There are two real aspects of concern — Galway have regressed rather than progressed in their three league games, and secondly, for a large chunk of this match, they just weren’t competitive.

Of course, it would be very unfair to blame all of Galway’s current difficulties on the new manager — the graph has been on a downward trend since the last All-Ireland success of 2001, although last Autumn there was a strong feeling among the grassroots that the new manager should have been someone who was embedded in the under-age structure of the county over recent years.

The quick-fix solutions certainly have worked for Galway — our best football of the league in recent years was produced under the guidance of Liam Sammon in 2009, certainly our ‘best value for money manager’ of the last few seasons.

But back to the nuts and bolts of last Sunday’s encounter when Galway started with plenty of buzz, leading for the first 22 minutes of the match, almost an exact replica of the match patterns against Monaghan and Down.

It’s a bit like the soldier going into the jungle to fight a war with only one clip of bullets to fire off — once the magazine has emptied there is absolutely nothing left in the Galway ammunition belt.

After a reasonable start, Galway again struggled to hold their own in midfield but of equal concern from an early stage was the success that the Mayo forwards were having in one-to-one confrontations with the Galway defence.

Those fears turned into reality 22 minutes into the first half when Jason Doherty shrugged off the challenge of David Reilly, soloed unchallenged through the heart of the Galway defence, before shooting low past Padraig Lally for the first goal of the game. Against a Tyrone or a Kerry defence, Doherty would have been flattened — either legally or illegally — 20 yards further out from goal.

For more, read this week's Connacht Tribune.