‘No vengeance’ in O’Mahony switch To rivals

JOHN O’MAHONY managed that rare trick: guide Leitrim and Galway to generational success and yet retain his popularity on the ground in Mayo. The best proof of that is being elected as a TD for the Mayo constituency in 2007. He is asked if he remembers any days with Galway when the Mayo natives turned on him or had a cut. Only one rare instance springs to mind.

‘We played Mayo in a League final in 2001 – it was the year of the foot and mouth (outbreak) if you remember – Tyrone actually had to withdraw out of it. It was four Connacht teams. We got to the final without planning or wanting to be in a final – well you always want to be in a final but it was after 2000 (Galway’s All-Ireland final replay defeat by Kerry) so we were trying to deepen the panel, experimented a lot. Even from the League final to the All-Ireland final I think we had six or seven changes.

‘At that final in Croke Park – and maybe it would be a bit more obvious at a League final where you’d have a smaller crowd – somebody did shout something at me. And I got a letter of apology from the former chairman Fr Liam Morahan afterwards, hoping that I wasn’t insulted by it. That with all I had done for Mayo over the years no-one was entitled to be shouting at me like that. He must have heard it through the grapevine.

‘I made a conscious effort… when I went to a county I wanted to win everything I could with them but I would never portray that as vengeance for something that might have done in the past. I would have always said there was fierce rivalry but huge respect between Mayo and Galway and their supporters.’

And this does feel different when Owen Mulligan (right) gleefully mentions the potential prospect of Harte being booed by his own – ‘he’s the enemy now’.

‘It’s more volatile than it used to be,’ admits O’Mahony, ‘and social media plays its own part in that. It’s already playing a part in it when you have Muggsy’s reaction and Seán Cavanagh’s and

Joe Brolly’s from the other side. That’s before you start! So it is different, there’s no doubt about it.

‘But you’d still think and hope that Tyrone fans won’t boo Mickey Harte if Derry are playing them. But all bets are off on those things nowadays.’