Things couldn’t have gone much better for Colm Reape in his first Croke Park appearance for the Mayo senior side as a stunning goalkeeping display propelled Kevin McStay’s side to Division 1 FL honours against Connacht rivals Galway this afternoon.
Reape denied the Tribesmen on numerous occasions with a superb second-half save from Damien Comer one of many personal highlights as the Mayo net minder walked away with the man-of-the-match award in their 0-14 to 0-11 victory.
The Knockmore clubman was in unbeatable form between the posts and not only that, he also strode forward on three occasions to fire over long-range placed balls as the Connacht side got another boost on the eve of the championship.
The man of the moment didn’t hide what League success means to Mayo but he was quick to state that they won’t be losing the run of themselves with a mouth-watering clash against Roscommon around the corner next Sunday.
“I don’t know what to say even, it’s a great day for Mayo and it’s a building step for us. Game by game is our attitude and that’s how we take it,” Reape told TG4 as ‘The Green and Red of Mayo’ rang out around GAA HQ.
“A win today is great, we’ll enjoy it at the moment, we’ll recover tomorrow and then we’ve a big challenge again next week.”
It’s not every day that Mayo win a title in Croke Park – particularly when beating their provincial rivals – and Reape is hoping that they can go on to do even bigger and better things later this season.
“Galway are a brilliant side and at the end of the day, you want to play the best teams because they’re going to bring you on. It’s a building step from here, next week we’ll go again,” he said.
As regards his own display, Reape was modest and insisted that there was a slice of luck in his performance.
“As Gary (Matthews, Mayo goalkeeping coach) says to us, ‘you can get lucky sometimes but positioning is key’ so I’ll take lucky and good positioning!” Reape quipped.
