Mayo's field of dreams to get a very much needed makeover

by Martin Carney

MACHALE Park.

The home of Mayo football.

A Mecca for many; a place of pilgrimage where followers, supporters and the curious gather to vent their opinions and roar encouragement for their team on match days.

For years now the park has become synonymous with county club finals as well as league and championship inter-county games, and is the recognised hub for county administrative and training purposes.

In high summer, when Mayo teams of all grades and codes, male and female, defend their corner of the footballing world, there are few venues nationwide to match the atmosphere, ribald humour and intense passion evident in the stadium.

It’s oft forgotten that MacHale Park was at the outset, and for a long time indeed, the property of Castlebar Mitchels.

Opened in 1931, it has been generally the main venue for Mayo home games since. Change throughout has been a regular feature and in 1952, after some major renovations the ground capacity swelled to 40,000.

A significant landmark was the completion of the Gerry McDonald stand in 1980.

With a rotational venue policy involving the other competing counties in Connacht in place, a regular run of championship games at the ground looked guaranteed.

Yet a vote by the Connacht Council in 1990 designating Hyde Park in Roscommon as the sole venue for Connacht finals changed everything.

Backed into a corner, Mayo resisted, managed to get the decision reversed and again embarked on further restorative work at in Castlebar.

Around the same time, pressure increased on the Mitchels to relinquish sole ownership on the property.

After lengthy negotiations, eventually, in 2005, Mayo County Board wrested control of the ground from the club on a 50-year lease basis.

By managing to secure substantial funding, the board, to their credit, improved media facilities and meeting and changing rooms in a short period of time.

The playing field itself, however, continued to lag behind others on many fronts.

Compact is the best word to the describe it, so to address this the county board are embarking on a scheme to extend the playing area.

Anyone who has played in MacHale Park, or certainly who played there in bygone times, knows that the surface changes dramatically depending on the season.

Wet weather guaranteed a clingy and heavy soil that sapped the energy.

In dry, hot weather, usually the end result was a rock-hard surface and on days like this, though the ball whizzed about, game standards were generally better.

In a recent programme on the Mayo GAA Facebook page, I listened to the eminent scribe Sean Rice recount evenings spent there as a child as he helped remove stones from the pitch as it was being laid. Local voluntary efforts in getting the field up to an acceptable standard for play cannot be underestimated.

Foresight

The ground, as I earlier stated, was originally was the property of Castlebar Mitchels GAA Club and it was due to the great foresight of people like the late Gerry McDonald that the venue developed in the way it did.

In the '80s and early '90s, under the direction of the likes of Mick Ruane, Paddy Kerrigan, Leo Doherty and others, lateral drains were installed width-wise on the field in order to improve drainage. Though this proved successful, the issue of poor soil texture remained and has been a problem ever since.

In order to address this, the board, under the guidance of Michael Diskin, has decided that the playing surface will undergo a complete overhaul this autumn in the hope that, once completed, MacHale Park will boast one of the leading playing surfaces in Gaelic games. It is an ambitious venture but with the overall good of Mayo football in mind one worth pursuing.

In a playing sense, it’s fair to ask if MacHale Park has been a happy hunting ground for the home team.

Somewhat surprisingly, I found – thanks to some research on the excellent Mayo GAA Blog – that the record of Mayo teams in Connacht senior finals at the venue is less successful than what I would have expected.

Since its ‘second opening’, so to speak, in 1952,- Mayo have contested 20 finals at the venue. A won eight, drawn two and lost 10 record is unimpressive.

So much for home comforts when playing provincial finals!

Disappointing

Delving deeper into the figures, what was particularly disappointing was the period between 1952 and ’79.

Of the eight contested finals in this period at the venue, a solitary win is all they achieved.

Matters improved marginally from 1981 to 1996, when from the seven finals contested Mayo emerged victorious three times, with two draws and two defeats completing the record.

To give them their due, aside from a loss in 2007, Mayo have since been successful in four of five finals contested.

Why the poor record I wonder? Had it to do with pressure? Was an undue weight of expectancy the price of playing finals in MacHale Park?

Whereas there isn’t any definitive answer, one of the contributory factors I believe was the congestive nature of the pitch.

MacHale Park is a tight ground, one in its present state that favours defenders above attackers. Finding space here has always required ingenuity, clever movement and good timing.

Releasing the right pass at the right time into the right space was a prerequisite in this ground more than elsewhere.

Ciaran McDonald was a master of this skill amalgam. Roscommon’s Tony McManus and Galway’s Padraig Joyce were like sorcerers in the implementation of this aspect of the game.

Having an appreciation of the importance of accurate and well-timed passing and being able to execute them consistently escapes many unfortunately.

The county board, aside from planning a new playing surface, have also determined to extend the length of the pitch by pushing it back another four or five meters at the Albany end of the ground.

This can only be for the good of the game in general and adds an exciting extra to an already impressive ground.

As to their plans for widening the pitch, I am in the dark.

Personally, I’d love to see the front row of the seating on the McHale Road side of the ground removed and an extra metre or two of pitch-width added.

There is much to anticipate then in the short term around MacHale Park.

Let’s hope it will always be the field of dreams for every Mayo person.