Aidan O’Shea remains totally focused on unfinished business

Aidan O’Shea was unimpressed with the controversial newspaper interview given last December by previous Mayo joint football managers Pat Holmes and Noel Connelly.

Holmes and Connelly had outlined what they believed to be the reasons behind their eventual ousting in the aftermath of the 2015 All-Ireland semi-final replay defeat to Dublin, to be later replaced by Stephen Rochford.

Holmes was quoted as saying "if some egos aren't checked and outside influences curbed, the problems will continue", and there was also a reference to their unease at O'Shea being selected to take part in the Toughest Challenge TV programme.

At the announcement of AIB’s sponsorship of this year’s football championship, O’Shea was asked it that interview felt like an old ghost coming back to haunt Mayo.

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“I wouldn’t say haunt,” he said. “It’s not a word I would use. It’s old news. . . That’s their prerogative. It’s not something I dwell on. I’ve completely moved on myself personally and the group have completely moved forward.

“And I think Mayo people, the support hasn’t wavered in what we have done. We’re trying to do something that is bigger than an interview in a dull week in December. We’re trying to win an All-Ireland for lots of reasons but that’s not one of them.

“But I’m not going to get into it. It’s not the time or place but some day in the future I’m sure I’ll go back over it, yeah. I’m not going to get into it because I didn’t get the right to respond at the time. And I’m not going to do it now six months later. It’s a lack of respect.”

O’Shea was more open about Mayo’s chances of finally landing that elusive All-Ireland title in 2017, despite their heavy defeat to Dublin in the league, and close escape from relegation to Division Two.

Disappointing aspect

“No, I wouldn’t be concerned about the margin of defeat. We were just a little all over the place. I wasn’t with the group, and I know there were disappointed, and sometimes we have games like that, blown out of it.  Cork last year, Dublin this year, but we didn’t look too much into it. We didn’t highlight that game at the start of the year.

“Hopefully there will come a time we play Dublin again. We wanted to win every game, but we didn’t single out Dublin on March whatever. If we’d beaten Monaghan at home, beaten Cavan, we would have been in the league final. That’s the more disappointing aspect, against teams we should be beating. We didn’t find it to get over the line.

“It was more the games we should have win. Monaghan should have beaten us by more, and against Cavan we were just asleep at times. For a team that’s been around the block we should be seeing those games out.”

The sight of Kerry later beating Dublin in the league final may have offered other All-Ireland contenders some hope, but O’Shea insisted Mayo already have that self-belief in themselves.

“I don’t think we need encouragement from Kerry. We feel we’ve had a few good battles with Dublin. They’ve had the upper hand, no doubt about it, but we didn’t need Kerry for us to know Dublin are beatable. Throughout the league Donegal drew with them,  Monaghan ran them very close. We know we have a game capable of beating them, but again, look, it’s a long way away before we’re playing Dublin, so it’s not something we’re focusing on.

“I think from last year, going in after five Connacht titles in a row, maybe subconsciously we took our eye off the ball. Those things happen. Yeah, maybe that edge around the Connacht championship is back, and we really want to win that, and maybe put us in better stead.

“There was a serious shock factor last year, and I think you saw that in the way we struggled over some of the qualifiers. So yeah, we’re in better place, from a player point of view, participation, and just bedding in with Stephen. That all bodes well.”