Kevin McStay hails 'brilliant reaction' after six-week break

Mayo handed Kerry a five-point defeat in Killarney yesterday. The win came after a six-week break in Mayo’s calendar in which McStay gave the players two weeks off.

"I think we managed the six weeks quite well. We took two weeks off, just the nature of the calendar. It’s a funny one. We hadn’t planned for it! That’s being absolutely truthful, sure how could you plan for it? You’d be mad."

Mayo were coming off a relentless but successful league campaign and a loss to Roscommon in the opening round of the championship. The 40-day respite gave the team an opportunity to regroup ahead of their clash with the All-Ireland champions.

"Giving lads an opportunity to get away, I know a lot of them got away to the sun. Got a break from us, fed up listening to us for a while. When we came back we doubled down in terms of, 'Come on lads, we’ve put a lot of work into this. We can’t walk away from this, we have to plough on.’ We got a brilliant reaction."

McStay also felt confident in his bench’s impact, with Mayo subs combining for 1-01 in the end.

"We had a feeling we could keep this game boiling like mad up to the 50th minute and then we knew we had a lot of experience on the subs bench. And we have other very fine players on that subs bench." McStay said.

"But there is no point in just coming on, you have to make an impact. We have really been hammering that home. I'll have a look at the tape tomorrow or whenever I get a chance, but I feel they did."

Kerry boss Jack O’Connor expressed his disappointment with the loss, a first for Kerry in Killarney since 1995.

"We were a bit off it today. Disappointing. Back to the drawing board. Mayo deserved to win and could have won by more but for our goalkeeper. But overall plenty of food for thought