Championship is the priority for both managers - Martin Carney

Donegal and Mayo meet in the final game of the Allianz League on Sunday in Castlebar with the winners likely to be in a league final. And yet it is an uncomfortable position for both managers Jim McGuinness and Kevin McStay.

Former Donegal and Mayo player Martin Carney is well placed to take a look at the game and how it might pan out.

“Both Mayo and Donegal are in the same position. They play championship on the 6th of April. Mayo play Sligo here in Castlebar. You might say there is no comparison between Sligo and Donegal meeting Derry with Sligo fighting for survival in Division 3. But if you look at Sligo against Galway last year, Galway just scraped through in Markievicz Park in the first round.

“I see a huge similarity with both managers on Sunday. Their priority is a fortnight later in their respective championship. The priority will be to get through this game without a major injury to major players. The logic is that managers won’t play their better players.

“Mayo have the likes of Paddy Durcan, who has been out for the last year with a cruciate ligament. And if he is to be part of the championship shake-up he needs to get some game time this weekend. I gather he is training. Diarmuid O’Connor is in the same boat and I’m not sure of the situation of Tommy Conroy,

“I think Kevin McStay and Jim McGuinness, at this stage, know their championship team.  They want to keep their better players fit and at the same time they want to give game time to players coming back from injury and the fringe players.

“Mayo, in their last four games, have got three wins and a draw. They’ve got a bit of a winning momentum behind them and I think they will be keen to continue that.

“The conundrum for Donegal, if they don’t win at the weekend, they are going into championship on the back of two losses. 

“It is very difficult to understand how both managers are going to approach it. I would be a firm believer that going into championship with a few wins behind you is a helluva lot better than going into championship having been on the wrong side of results,” said Carney, who also feels that there should not be a league final.

“The league is a league is a league. It shouldn’t have a final in my book.  Having league finals over two days is essentially giving extra games but getting extra revenue primarily. But with the way the season is scheduled it is not doing any favours to teams.

“With everything shoehorned into such a tight schedule now I think finals are something that teams could do without,” said Carney, who referenced what happened to Mayo a few years ago when they won a league final and then lost to  Roscommon in the championship six days later.

“I think that set in place a thought-process that getting to a league final can do more damage than good.”

Looking at Donegal’s league campaign, Carney feels there may be an issue with the Donegal defence conceding 0-25, 1-19 and 0-21 in their last three games against Tyrone, Derry and Galway.

“I think Donegal might be a little bit slower in getting there than others under the new rules.

“The centrality of the kicking game is going to become more and more of a feature. Moving the ball quicker inside by foot is going to put bigger demands on players. And de-programming players from the way they have played since they started the game, maybe 10-15 years ago, getting them to play a new way. I wonder if  Donegal have fully got there yet. Indeed, has any team fully got there yet.”

Carney said he was intrigued by the after-match comments of Jim McGuinness at the weekend saying Donegal were back to Year One.

“I found that interesting. He was re-thinking completely the way he set his teams up; the demands he would expect into the future from his players. Has he got to the stage yet where he is comfortable with the new enhancements? Are the players comfortable with the enhancements?

“There is a great honesty about McGuinness and he wears his heart on his sleeve a lot more than others. And that’s what I love about the guy. After matches when Jim talks, he is speaking from the heart.

“I just thought last week (in his after-match comments), did he betray an inner frustration that he simply hasn’t had enough time to get the new demands that the enhancements make on players into place.

“I said before that I went to the Derry championship game last year in Celtic Park and I was fascinated by the whole theatre of Jim and his players in the warm-up. He was totally and utterly in control of every single morsel of preparation.

“He’s Donegal to the bone. He’s deeply rooted in it,” said Carney, who wouldn’t rule out McGuinness going back to a different code in the future and he also feels that McGuinness will never go to coach GAA in another county.”

To sum up the game on Sunday in Castlebar, Carney agrees that Mayo need to get something out of the game as they could be relegated on seven points, where they sit going into the game.

“It would be an extraordinary set of circumstances for that to happen.

“I think they will beat Donegal because I think Donegal will not risk their major assets. They will use the occasion to give as many of the guys who need a bit of extra football an opportunity.

“I think Mayo will win this. And apart from guaranteeing them their place in the Division, it will, depending on the results  elsewhere, put them in the league final.”

Asked if Sunday’s game will be more akin to a challenge game, Carney says: “Maybe we are not being fair to them in saying that, but it is the reality.  Both managers, due to the proximity of the championship game, will be keen, yes, to get a good run out, to get a lot of the fringe players with game time. Will it have the intensity that you will have a couple of weeks later? No.”

RULE ENHANCEMENTS

When it comes to the new rules, Martin Carney is very happy.

“To me, I would be positive about them. I love the contested kick-outs; I love the scraps for possession. I don’t know if you watched the Hogan Cup final. It was played under the old rules and it would put years on you; everything lateral hand-passing.

“I think a bit of chaos, the little bit of uncertainty; the little bit of scope for individualisation; the encouragement to take risks; two pointers; all of those are positive.

“I don’t like the place-kicks outside the arc being rewarded with two points. And I think pro-rata the return for a goal ought to have been put up to four points.

“From what I have seen so far has given me a lot of hope that the skills of passing the ball with the foot will become more important as the game takes deeper root. And I think it is a helluva sight better than what we have watched over the last number of years with this endless monotony of lateral play. You could bring the crossword with you to a game and you wouldn’t miss anything.”