Following the thrilling All-Ireland semi final draw between Mayo and Kerry, Stephen Rochford considered the prospect of a huge chunk of his squad having to endure more epic round-trips to Dublin and back.
“I’d probably be considering it [time off work],” he told Colm Parkinson.
“If their boss listens to The GAA Hour, you might put in a word with them.”
Aside from the mammoth task of trying to get past a young, hungry and talented Kerry team, the Mayo boss has had to contend with the wearying logistics of getting key players back from the capital and as fresh as possible for the task at hand. Rochford commented:
“Look, it’s the same for everybody else. We have a couple of players that live and work in Dublin so how we manage their energy levels this week, in relation to their travel and what they have to do, we’ll throw that all in.”
In those two sentences, Rochford was overstating ‘everybody else’ and understating the ‘couple of players that live and work in Dublin’.
In the current Mayo panel, there are ten players that live, work or study in Dublin. Five are in college but the other five have jobs on the east coast and face regular, lengthy trips back west for training and matches. And that is only during the championship. It gets a lot more hectic and demanding when club commitments come into it.
Here are the Mayo players that earn a crust, and reside, in Dublin:
- Tom Parsons
- Seamie O’Shea
- Jason Doherty
- Chris Barrett
- Rob Hennelly
As for the five panel members in third level education up in Dublin, they are:
- Conor Loftus
- Stephen Coen
- Paddy Durcan
- Conor O’Shea
- Diarmuid O’Connor
Durcan and his four teammates are not facing the massive back-and-forths between Dublin and Mayo but having five key men on the road for long stretches of such a pivotal game week is far from ideal. Certain players often use up annual leave so they can focus on big matches while others come to agreements were they can make time back later in the year.
The issue is non-existent for Kerry. The county’s PRO confirmed to SportsJOE that none of the current senior team live, work or study in Dublin. There are a couple of fringe players from The Kingdom in the capital for college but not first team regulars.
“Our travel difficulties are all within the county,” the spokesperson remarked.
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