HORAN LEADING THE CHANGING OF MAYO GUARD
Horan has no room for sentiment as young guns look to learn on the hoof
THE pace of Mayo’s changing of the guard has been swift.
Any sense that James Horan’s second coming as manager would be one last chance for the band to get back together and go all the way has been quickly dispensed with.
It’s clear that sentiment has no place in team selection.
In their championship opener against Leitrim this year, Horan blooded eight debutants. In the Connacht semi-final win over Roscommon, totems like Seamus O’Shea and Tom Parsons didn’t make the matchday squad, while Colm Boyle and Keith Higgins didn’t get off the bench. In the Connacht final, it was as much the new faces who delivered the Nestor Cup as the old guard.
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For Horan, it was both planned and part of the natural evolution of things. The county had to move on from the side that came so close to glory so often, but some of the county’s emerging young tyros have forced the issue too.
Evolution
“There is a few things to it, I suppose, there is the natural evolution of a team, that happens,” Horan says. “There is nothing like a few injuries to bring on new players as well . . . Then the way the season went this year, in particular, with the shop window of the club championship, it had a lot of players who really shone through that.
“Then the inter-county season straight after just made it a really interesting dynamic and probably added to a lot of players being involved.
“The natural order of things is that there has been a strong team there for a number of years. Time waits for no man as well; if guys are playing well they will get their shot,” he adds.
“It’s all that mix, I suppose, and we are lucky we have a lot of real quality young guys, as you’ve seen over the past number of weeks.
“We are just hoping to continue that, we don’t see it as young and old at this stage. The guys are training together, whoever does well plays. That is where we are at.”
It has meant some hard conversations with players who have gone to the well for Horan and Mayo time and again. They had to be pulled aside and, before restrictions were eased yesterday, told they wouldn’t be travelling. It’s particularly tough when defeat could well mean the end of careers in some cases.
“There are some conversations where it is one of the tougher sides of the job. But you’ve seen a lot of those players play over the last decade, and how committed and how straight and honest they are and how they play,” Horan says.
“We always say that players are the first to know; players know. And it’s funny if you lay out the criteria, the guys in form and the guys that are playing well, regardless of whether they are just in or here ten years, or age or size, it doesn’t matter. The player in form plays and we have a clear criteria on that.
“It makes things clear for everyone, it makes it more straightforward maybe but still guys are going to be very disappointed for sure but that’s the nature of sport, or high-level sport.”
If he’s brought in new faces then he’s also redeployed existing weapons in a different way. The vexed issue of Aidan O’Shea’s best position has swung again and now he sees more time at the edge of the square. The extended break has given Cillian O’Connor a chance to heal. Conor Loftus has found a new home at midfield.
“It’s funny, sometimes you play in a position and your form mightn’t be as good as you wanted and whatever you try doesn’t seem to be working or whatever and sometimes you change a position and it can give you freedom, particularly if you’re in a wing position or corner-forward,” Horan continues.
“You’re against the sideline sometimes so it’s more defined whereas if you’re in the middle it can be a more open game, particularly in midfield, you can get on the ball more and you
can dictate more where you try to win the ball.
“I think that’s an element of it. But Conor played with Crossmolina this year, and again it’s an outcome of the club championship that he played very well with Crossmolina in the middle of the field and was excellent in a number of games and scored heavily from the middle of the field, so it’s something we were very aware of and tried it there in a few games and it’s worked very well.”
Mayo return to Croke Park on Sunday to face Tipperary, whose win over Cork didn’t surprise Horan.
“I don’t get shocked anymore in football. So much stuff can happen in Gaelic football,” he says.
“Our opponents are a really good team, they have shown that for a number of years; they’re strong, a lot of them have been together since minor and they have some very good players and their own way of playing and are very competitive.
“With that game I wasn’t at all surprised to be honest. As we have done all year, we won’t look too much at what others are doing; we have more than enough ourselves to try and get right and improve and develop and that’s where we will put our energy and we’ll have a crack at the game.”