Search Results for 'Brian McDermott'

There is no room left for error for any of the eight sides left in the Connacht Gold Mayo GAA Senior Football Championship as the quarter-finals roll around this weekend.

Moycullen have made a significant move up the betting for the All-Ireland Senior Club Football championship after they surged into the Connacht semi-finals at Westport's expense.

They survived the loss of their inspirational full back Kevin Keane after just ten minutes, then lost their goalkeeper Patrick O’Malley to a black card with six minutes to go and conceded a penalty, which was converted and saw their lead pared back to three points, then two points and then one point as six agonising minutes of injury time seemed to take an age to tick by, but when the full time whistle was blown, the warriors from Westport were All Ireland intermediate champions.

It all began for Westport last May in Sean Duffy Park in Ardnaree, where they just about had enough to see off the challenge of the north Mayo men who themselves were only coming down from their own All Ireland adventure and on Sunday, it'll come to a conclusion in Croke Park, what a ten months it has been for Westport. They've moved on from their narrow 0-15 to 2-7 win over Ardnaree, to within 60 minutes of All Ireland final glory if they can get over Meath and Leinster champions, St Colmcille's.

It was a day that will live long in the memory of those who made the trip to Ennis from the seaside town of Westport on Sunday. Westport are in the All Ireland Intermediate final and that's all that matters now, but if they hadn't been able to surge past Kenmare in extra time, they would have been kicking themselves for a long time, because they dominated this game and should have rattled the back of the net on a few more occasions than they did.

It’s unlikely that you’ll ever see this combination of Mayo players ever line out together again for a competitive fixture, but it gave a number of players a taste of what it’s like in the big leagues they’ll not forget and some others who have serious designs on being around there for a long time plenty to work on.

Kiltimagh v Burrishoole

In this week’s column I expected to be wallowing about the glorious weather and plethora of club games in Mayo last weekend, that is as much of a mention it will get unfortunately. Just when we thought the dust had settled on our 2015 Championship we were greeted with the earth shattering news on Tuesday morning that there were major problems in the Mayo GAA family. The first murmur I heard was when the principal of St Attracta’s NS in Charlestown (Brian McDermott, an avid Mayo supporter) mentioned it to me in the school assembly yard at 9am. I walked back to work receiving texts saying “turn on the radio”. One message from England said “what the hell has happened”, I had no idea what was going on. For the rest of Tuesday my phone hopped as I spoke to countless journalists, radio stations, and even did a piece with Marty Morrissey for the Six One News. The media world was gone crazy looking for the story. The Mayo players had issued a vote of “no confidence” in the management.