Last night’s county board meeting of Mayo GAA took centre stage both nationally and locally following the recommendation of Noel Connelly and Pat Holmes as the new senior football managerial team last Saturday night. The handling of the appointment has been the hot topic of discussion around the country since it was announced on Saturday night.
At last night’s meeting, Mayo GAA chairman Paddy McNicholas was due to make a statement on the process of the appointment and take questions from the delegates in what was expected to be a very vocal meeting. While the Holmes and Connelly ticket has been selected by as the preferred choice, they still had to be ratified by the delegates from the clubs in Mayo at the meeting.
The handling of the process, had left a lot of calls of questions to be answered by the top table of Mayo GAA at last night’s meeting.
The credentials of the two men given the job are not in any doubt, with the duo guiding Mayo to an All Ireland u21 title in 2006. Holmes himself was the last manager to bring Mayo to national senior success, winning the National League in 2001 during his first stint with the side. He also was in charge of the Castlebar Mitchels team that reached the All Ireland club final this year. The back room team that the pair had put together also includes their trusted lieutenant Micheál Collins as a selector, the Lacken man was involved with their u21 teams and played in the 1989 All Ireland final. It also includes Donie Buckley who has been the coach of the team under James Horan, and Ballaghaderreen native Barry Solan as the strength and conditioning coach, who has been involved with both Kildare and Laois in recent years.
For more on what happened at last night’s meeting, log on to www.advertiser.ie/mayo/sport today.
