ROCHFORD EXIT CAN KILL MAYO DREAM
AFTER two agonising onepoint defeats in the last two All-Ireland finals the Mayo football team should not have been in line for another kick in the teeth on the week of the 2019 decider. The resignation of Stephen Rochford, however, is such a happening for Aidan O’Shea and Co. It’s difficult to appreciate how this came to pass. Or how Rochford would be left in a corner in Mayo, where he felt that he did not have the support of the county board. The man did an amazing job in bringing Mayo so close to a treasured All-Ireland title. Rochford deserved to land one at least, but could easily have won both the 2016 and 17 finals against Dublin — and nobody in Dublin would have had cause for complaint or regret if that was how the two games turned out. Of course, Rochford also messed up in his three-year reign. The demotion of David Clarke for the 2016 final replay was a decision that landed somewhere been ‘atrocious’ and ‘idiotic.’ It might be repeatedly written, and fairly so in the immediate and distant future, that Rochford single-handedly cost Mayo that All-Ireland. If that line sullies his legacy, then Rochford cannot complain either. The best and strongest bosses live and die on the biggest of decisions. Rochford’s resignation might also herald the end of this particular Mayo team. The likes of the O’Shea brothers and Lee Keegan and Cillian O’Connor have now lived through three different management teams. Those four are now going to be asked to take a deep breath and go again with a fourth man. And they’ll do it. Of course they will, but each is going to have to do so with the same feeling of regret that Stephen Rochford has within him as he walks away.