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GAA

12th Dec 2025

Mayo boss gives hugely positive update on Kobe McDonald playing situation

SportsJOE

Great news.

Mayo fans will be delighted to hear manager Andy Moran’s latest comments on Kobe McDonald.

The young star has already signed for AFL side St Kilda as a Category B rookie; news which stunned and saddened the county, as it looked like the most talked about talent in the country would not get the chance to line out for the senior team.

However, as Moran pointed out in an interview with the Smaller Fish GAA podcast, McDonald is still here for nine months, and his new club want him training and playing.

He said: “We’re going to take our time with Kobe.

“He’s here for another nine months. He’s doing his Leaving Cert. He played a schools game (this week).

“We just need to take our time and we’ll see where we are, I’d say in around January, February, March time. We’ll keep in constant contact with his mum and dad and see where he is.

“St Kilda are very, very sound. They want him to train. They want him to play. They want him to play football. We’ll just see how it goes over the next nine to ten months.”

Moran continued: “Even when you see (Mark) O’Connor for Geelong and for Dingle last week… when they’re home in these three to four months, they do realise that in professional sport you need to play ball. Kobe likes a bit of basketball and all that sort of stuff. I’m sure they’ll be very aligned for him to play whatever he needs to play without overdoing it.”