The tunnel under the stand in MacHale Park has it’s own microclimate which even on a good day sees the wind whip through it with a cutting sting.
A cold and wet Paddy Durcan took on the captains role despite having yet to have had the chance to warm himself up with a shower after Mayo’s victory over Roscommon to pick over what had happened out on the field with the press 20 or so minutes after the full time whistle had gone on Saturday night.
Captaining Mayo on such a day is an honour he was greatly privileged to have been given he told us: “It is an immense honour, I was delighted to be asked - there is a number of leaders in the group and look anytime you are asked to captain Mayo it is a huge honour and something I’m very proud of for myself and my family.”
It was hard going out on the field, but Durcan was pleased with how well his side did in the circumstances - “It’s tough going out there - a bit of a game of two half, a good battle, but look we are happy to get the two points anyway and it is a good step for next week.
“It was really, really challenging and probably as challenging as I’ve played in, in a long, long time so 0-5 to 0-1 wasn’t too bad. But we knew we’d to add on a few scores early in the second half and we just plugged away and plugged away and we finally got there.”
The conditions made even doing the simple things hard the Castlebar Mitchels man added saying: “Even working the ball out first half, getting it past the 45 m line or trying to solo or simple things it was really, really tough - it was a battle and grind and working for each other and work hard and I thought we did that.
“Just trying to get field position, simple things like soloing and stuff that should be naturally easy was just so hard out there and trying to work the ball out as best as we could - but it was extremely challenging.
As for what this means for his side, it is just a stepping stone and they need to follow it up again next weekend he believes saying: “Look it’s two points and you want to start it with two points and we did that tonight, but look we started the league last year with two points in Monaghan and then we lost the next game against Kerry, but we have to follow it on in Healy Park and I’m looking forward to it.”
