How were Mayo going to react after seeing a place in the last eight slip though their fingers in the final quarter against Cork a week earlier was the big question heading into Pearse Stadium last Sunday.
Would they be able to shake it off and get right back on the wagon as they have done so many times in recent memory or would they fall to the boys from south of the border and exit the championship while the last embers of Bonfire Night were still smouldering along the rugged coastline of the county?
Well the reaction that was needed came a few days before the game even was contested according to Kevin McStay not long after the full time whistle was blown in Salthill.
"I felt our reaction to what happened last week, to a certain degree, was Wednesday night. We got a great reaction. Friday just embedded that a bit more, so we came up here very confident about ourselves in terms of how we were going to play" said the Ballina native.
He added that: "We came with big expectations about the fixture, really did, because the history of this is generally toss of a coin so why wouldn’t we come with big expectations?
“We wanted a big reaction from last week. We didn’t play that badly (against Cork ) but didn’t play long enough - but I think we’ve moved that on decently today, not significantly.
“There’s lots of room for improvement and we’ll try and eke out that improvement this week when we get back to Mayo. But for now the golden ticket was the passage to Dublin next week, so we have to wait for the draw tomorrow so see where we are then.”
There was no acrimony from from the loss to Cork the previous week he said:" Disappointment, not hurt. We move on so quickly, you just have to. Training Wednesday, get ready Friday, you can’t be hanging around feeling sorry for yourself. We are not that sort of group anyhow.
Having to dig it out right at the death was also something he was pleased to see his side were able to do against last year' beaten All Ireland finalists saying: "The conditions were difficult, it was a good gut-check for us right down to the end. There was a lot of pinballing going on in the last minute or two to keep your health check up to speed.”
McStay made four changes to the starting 15 from the one that was named, with experienced players like Kevin McLoughlin and Jason Doherty two of those brought in to the starting side and they were brought in for a very important reason.
"I think if you go through, you’ll see the golden trade-off was experience around the middle third. We wanted to load that because we knew it was going to be a red-hot battle" said the Mayo manager.
One who didn't get the starting nod, but had a major impact in the contest when introduced was Cillian O'Connor and to have him back was a huge boost for the side according to his manager.
"It was great to have him. I know there was a lot of stuff mentioned about him in the last ten days. This is between Cillian and us; we feel all these things out and we do what’s right for Mayo. He knows that 100 percent."
Mayo's retention of the ball from their own kick-outs is one of the areas that came in for a lot of focus during the game and in the imeaite aftermath - it is something they will be working on this week, but the conditions also had a major part to play he maintained.
"It’s a big number and we’ll have a think about that during the week. But the breeze was a big issue. When you look at the fine detail … a lot of ball broke, it hit off knees, it hit off an ankle and ricocheted into a Galway hand.
“Now, is that hunger or is that just a break? I have to check that with the boys and make sure we weren’t idle when it was there, but I’d a sense we were breaking it fine, we just not ending up with the ball.
“You like to be on top of your kick-outs, but in the first half we were getting pockets inside, lots of them, but it was very difficult to shoot. The boys were telling us inside at half-time that was a big breeze, very hard to shoot. You saw some of the shots, you thought they were 20 yards over the bar and they fell on the penalty spot, so that was certainly part of the game.”
