Picked up where we left off.
The tit-for-tat nature of last week’s drawn game recommenced right from the off in Croke Park as Mayo exploded into an early lead.
Andy Moran was still moving around the Mayo full forward line like a jack-in-the-box and Shane Enright, who received an early booking was struggling to keep tabs on him.
The big talking point from last week’s game was the positioning of Aidan O’Shea, and as it turned out he began his day floating around the Mayo half back line zone, but was soon rotating this role with Donal Vaughan who started his day on Kieran Donaghy.
Both teams were in narky form from the off, and Aidan O’Shea’s early booking was a direct result of this.
Cillian O’Connor was punishing Kerry’s indiscipline in defence, kicking five of their first seven points from a dead ball situation.
We thought we’d seen it all, but then in the twentieth minute of the game, the Kerry goalkeeper Brian Kelly was about to restart the game after a Cillian O’Connor free, but he ended up only slowing it down.
We’ve seen the short kick-out game taking on a new life in recent Championship games, but this surely tops the lot as the Kerry man kicked it backwards, behind his own goals and wide.
You would think that with the introduction of the mark at the beginning of the year, teams would be more inclined to target their big men in the middle of the field, but it’s all to rare we see them going short.
The rule is that a kickout can travel 13mts without being touched by an opposing player, which has lead to goalkeepers kicking laterally and inviting their defenders to retreat to collect it.
Nobody could quite believe what they had seen, but it surely ignites the debate on whether the kick-out should have to go long in order to prevent this excessively cautious possession based approach.
That’s what the half time talk was all about.
https://twitter.com/Woolberto/status/901449490640588800
And the reducto ad abusrdum of the short kick-out reaches the end-game; brian Kelly kicks it out for a 45…
— david kelly (@dk3lly) August 26, 2017
Brian Kelly's Kerry kickouts are all over the place. Not responding quick enough to space outside.
— Tony Leen (@tonyleen) August 26, 2017
Kelly’s day was about to go from bad to worse after he was slow to react to a looping Donal Vaughan ball, and Diarmuid O’Connor nipped into goal.
Mayo went into the half-time break leading by five on a scoreline of 1-08 to 0-05.
Another big talking point was the introduction of Paddy Durcan for Donal Vaughan just before the break, Stephen Rochford wasn’t waiting around.
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