Mayo set for homecoming for the ages after history-making all-Ireland win
By David Young and Gráinne Ní Aodha, Press Association
Mayo is braced for a homecoming for the ages as tens of thousands are expected to welcome back the county’s history-making Gaelic footballers after they ended 75 years of hurt by winning the All-Ireland.
The team’s dramatic triumph against Kerry in the men’s senior football final at Dublin’s Croke Park on Sunday finally ended one of sport’s most famous and long-running curses and sparked scenes of mass jubilation back in Mayo.
The town of Castlebar will play host to Monday evening’s homecoming event, with massive crowds set to gather to witness the Sam Maguire cup being brought back by an all-Ireland winning team for the first time in seven and half decades.
Repeated all-Ireland final losses down the years have seen the hopeful rallying cry of “Mayo for Sam” become part of the popular lexicon across Ireland – it was even chanted by former US president Joe Biden during a visit to his ancestral home county in 2023.
The myth of the curse ensured Sunday’s victory transcended Gaelic games and sent reverberations well beyond the island of Ireland.
“Today, the dream becomes reality,” Biden said on social media after the win. “Congratulations to my friends in Mayo. You earned this victory. Enjoy every minute. Sam is coming home.”
Team members brought the Sam Maguire on a visit to children in Dublin’s Temple Street Hospital on Monday morning ahead of taking the train across to Mayo in the afternoon.
The homecoming at McHale Park in Castlebar is due to begin at 6pm.
Before Sunday’s remarkable scenes inside Croke Park, Mayo had not won the all-Ireland title in 75 years despite reaching the final 11 times since 1989.
The green-and-red team has lost by one point in three finals since it last won the championship.
The loses were put down to a myth that the 1951 winning team had not shown respect to a funeral they passed on their homecoming route.
It is said a relative of the dead person placed a curse on Mayo that the county would not win the Sam Maguire until every member of the 1951 team had died.
It was reported that the last surviving member of the 1951 team died in 2021.
The so-called curse has been criticised as not showing respect to the 1951 team. The facts behind the story have also been questioned, while others dismissed it as a convenient excuse for poor performance.
But some fans did believe there was a curse on their home county’s footballing chances and a long-awaited victory coming after the death of the last of the 1951 squad has done little to dispel the myth.
