While there was dis-appointment for the Donegal footballers in Armagh yesterday, in Croke Park the Donegal Senior hurlers produced a fantastic comeback – a 14 point turnaround – against Mayo to win the Nickey Rackard Cup.
Trailing by 0-11 to 0-3 just after the first half water-break and only slightly better approaching half-time it was not looking good but a Joe Boyle goal made things considerably better going in at half-time trailing by 1-8 to 0-14. Donegal hurled their way back in impressive style and were two points ahead early in the third quarter. Mayo, however, battled back and led by a point going down the home straight but Davin Flynn and Richie Ryan netted for Donegal in the last five minutes to give them what looked like a comfortable 3-18 to 0-21. Speaking to Charlie Collins afterwards, manager Mickey McCann hailed the teams performance saying Donegal deserved their victory and after a bad opening 15 minutes were the better team as Donegal’s quality players stepped up to the mark and hailed this as the sweetest of victories not having beat Mayo since 2004.
