HE HAS YET to face Kerry himself in the championship arena as a manager but Stephen Rochford is aware of the challenge hurtling towards him as Mayo manager on Sunday.
It’s three years since the epic and dramatic All-Ireland semi-final replay in the Gaelic Grounds, with this tie the first championship meeting between the counties since then.
Mayo haven’t seen off Kerry in a senior championship encounter since 1996. Rochford did oversee a successful trip last February to Tralee as Mayo raided Austin Stack Park for the two league points on offer.
But since then Kerry have picked up league and Munster crowns, which prompts the Crossmolina native to label them as the front-runners.
“They’re probably the form team in the country right now. We’re probably used to saying that about Dublin alone over the last few years, but as league champions and Munster champions they’ve been the form team of late.
“It’s going to take a top quality performance to get the better of them. I’ve watched the first half of that (Galway) game a few times, but I saw the Munster Final, the National League Final, their game against Dublin in the league in Tralee and our own game against them.”
There’s plenty debate about what match-ups Mayo will look to implement yet in Rochford’s eyes there can be an over-emphasis on that part of the game.
“Match-ups certainly play a part in it, but you can only look to influence maybe 50% of them because you’re looking to play to your own strengths and implement your own game-plan.
“Eamonn and Kerry will have an idea around what they will want to do to try and thwart that. You look at primary possession too. Getting your hands on that ball, be it from kick-outs or the throw-ups, and then holding on to it.
“The more you have of the ball, the less opportunity you’re giving the opposition, and the more you can starve the Kerry full-forward line, the more work they’ll have to do to get that ball back.
“Possession is nine-tenths of the law, and it’s key when you come to play the really top teams when you don’t have the ball.”
Mayo stumbled through their initial qualifier assignments. Then they exploded to life when handing out a hammering to Roscommon in their quarter-final replay and are now bracing themselves to take on Kerry.
“The first thing is we won’t be looking at the margin of victory to inform our thinking on what the game was,” says Rochford.
“The satisfying thing about it was that we were looking to push on into the 70th minute. That was something that we hadn’t been doing regularly.
“That’s probably about the height of our analysis of that game, because Kerry will pose a completely different set of problems.
“The important thing throughout the qualifiers was to win games, and to beat Roscommon was what was required to get into an All-Ireland semi-final.”
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