James Horan wants Aidan O'Shea restored to centre forward for Mayo's replay against Kerry after the experiment of putting him on Kieran Donaghy yesterday was deemed a failure.

In what was seen as a major gamble, O'Shea was deployed at full back to counteract Donaghy's aerial prowess, but the Kerry targetman was still highly effective with 2-5 coming directly off him.

"Donaghy did very well for much of the game. He scored a point, set up Stephen O'Brien's goal and set up Jack Barry for another goal chance," wrote Horan in his Irish Daily Star column.

"Making big bold calls takes real guts on the part of any manager. Stephen Rochford has always shown that boldness but, for me, this call wasn't the right one. It was clear that O'Shea isn't a natural defender. It's a specialist position.

"You can't take someone who's always been a midfielder, centre forward or full forward and turn them into a full back in a couple of weeks. Donaghy swung out of the tackle on a few occasions, sending O'Shea the wrong way.

"As the second half wore on, O'Shea came more into the game as Donaghy drifted out of it. But I think Mayo suffered from not having O'Shea out the field when the game was in the melting pot.

"Hindsight is 20/20 vision, but imagine O'Shea on the '40' marking Tadhg Morley. I think he'd have given him serious problems. 

"For the replay, I think Mayo would get far more benefit from having O'Shea out the field and maybe Donie Vaughan back on Donaghy. I'd prefer if Mayo concentrated on their own strengths. To me, one of those is having O'Shea in the half forward line."

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