Kildare vs. Mayo – first game, first meet-up

Kildare vs. Mayo – first game, first meet-up

Kildare vs. Mayo

Photo: Michael Maye

February 2nd dawned bright and sunny for the first away journey of the Mayo GAA faithful, and journey they did, in their droves. Loyalty was the theme of the day and in fact, the season ticket queue –indeed, queues – in Newbridge reached far beyond the regular ticket queue yesterday as green and red mingled with white and white to gain access to St. Conleth’s Park.

Mayo was strongly represented in the 6,000-strong crowd, who were treated to a thrilling encounter with plenty of ebb and flow and a hurling scoreline to boot. Not the result we were after, but plenty to talk about in the aftermath of the game, and  you can read the match report over on MayoGAAblog.com along with plenty of debate and analysis.

Club ’51 also had its first outing, convening in the Liffey Arms prior to the game. It was touch and go for a while, given that the door was still firmly locked when we arrived, and when the bolts finally came off and everyone piled in, the solitary staff member behind the bar was under considerable pressure to satisfy the thirsty hordes. We did try to give them some warning (honest!), but finally, reinforcements arrived on the scene and mercifully, a disaster of unimaginable proportions was averted and no-one left thirsty.

It was great to see such a big turnout, and thanks to everyone who stuck their heads in to say hello and mingle. We’ll have details of a meeting point for Omagh next Sunday up on the site during the week, and some other useful info. This time, as we’ll have the luxury of a bigger ground with over twice the capacity, we’ll also fix a meeting point within the ground so we can congregate inside as well as out! If you’re travelling, be sure and stick a flag or two in the boot and bring them along too – and make sure the lungs are well rested this week to be ready to cheer the lads on to what will hopefully be the first league win of the year.

Will Kildare v Mayo Be Moved to Croke Park?

Will Kildare v Mayo Be Moved to Croke Park?

Mayo v Kildare 16th Mar 2013

Mayo v Kildare NFL Div 1 16th March 2013 McHale Park

It was first reported in the Leinster Leader last Friday that  “negotiations are underway between Kildare GAA, Mayo and Croke Park, to move the Lilywhite’s opening Allianz National Football League fixture from St Conleth’s Park to Croke Park from the scheduled date of Sunday February 2nd to Saturday the 1st, as a curtain raiser to Dublin v Kerry. They were expecting a decision “in the coming days“. Kildare earned €150,000 last year by forfeiting their home advantage to play Donegal and Dublin in Croke Park, as part of the Spring Series.

Mayo GAA have stated at the weekend that “No negotiations took place on their side” and that the match would go ahead as per the master fixtures list, Sunday 2nd February in Newbridge.

With Kildares finances in such a bad state, you would think they would be pushing hard for the match to be moved to Croke Park, to increase their takings on the gate. Since the last time we played Kildare in Newbridge was in 2008, (we bet them that day 2-14 to 2-08) the capacity of St Conleths Park has been reduced hugely to just 6000 in recent years by the health & safety brigade.

Edit : With the Mayo team due to go on holidays to the far east on the 1st January, our first fbd match against NUIG which was due to be played on Sunday 5th January, will now be played the following Friday the 10th in Mc Hale park.

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