Mayo Wins First All-Ireland Title in 75 Years

By Andrew McGarry

Gaelic Sports

Mon 27 Jul 2026 at 9:57am

Mayo ended a 75-year wait by winning the All-Ireland football final against Kerry.

In short:

Mayo broke a long sporting drought by winning its first All-Ireland football title in 75 years, ending the 'Mayo curse'.

Mayo beat Kerry by three points in the final, winning its first title since 1951 when a priest allegedly placed a curse on the team.

What's next?

Young Mayo star Kobe McDonald signed a deal with St Kilda and will join the AFL side soon.

Mayo beat Kerry in the All-Ireland football final, breaking a 75-year title drought and ending the 'Mayo curse'.

The victory drew a line under three quarters of a century of heartbreak and became one of the biggest headlines in Gaelic games history.

A young footballer who could be a generational talent was a star of the unlikely victory and is headed to the AFL.

After winning the 1951 All-Ireland final, the Mayo team travelled home, celebrating, and passed by a funeral, which led to a priest placing a 'curse' on the county.

The players passed by a funeral in the village of Foxford, and the local priest took a dim view of their celebration.

The priest apparently placed a 'curse' on the county, saying it would not win the title again until all the team that played that day had died.

Mayo's All-Ireland Gaelic football title drought reached 70 years after another final of blown chances against Tyrone.

After 1951, it took Mayo 38 years to return to the All-Ireland final, and before this year, it had played in 11 All-Ireland finals since 1951 and lost them all.

In 2016, Mayo conceded two own goals against Dublin, forcing a draw and a replay, which it lost.

The last of these finals was in 2021, a few weeks before the final playing member of the original team, Paddy Prendergast, died aged 95.

The team did not make it back to Croke Park for the All-Ireland final until Sunday's decider against defending champions Kerry.

This year was the first opportunity to win the biggest game of the season since the elements of the 'curse' had been met.

Things did not start well, with Kerry superstar forward David Clifford scoring a goal in the 15th minute.

But Mayo fought back to be a point down at half-time.

Manager Andy Moran backed young talent, with 18-year-old Kobe McDonald and 19-year-old Darragh Beirne key to the team's success.

McDonald, who was selected by St Kilda late last year, would score three points in the final.

Beirne's brilliant finish scored Mayo's only goal and sparked the county's run to victory.

Rollercoaster ride to All-Ireland title for Mayo

It had not been an auspicious start to the football season for Mayo, as it was beaten by 10 points by Roscommon.

Andy Moran got stuck into the media for laughing at long-suffering fans' celebrations.

Mayo entered the All-Ireland Championship series still looking shaky, beating Monaghan by a point before a single-point loss to Tyrone.

Mayo bounced back with a win over Meath to reach the quarter-finals, then downed Cork at Croke Park to make the last four.

The semi-final turned out to be a one-sided affair against Louth, with Mayo winning by 17 points.

Moran hit back hard at the media.

"You laugh at that, lads. I don't laugh at that," Moran said at the press conference.

Moran found the question dismissive and disrespectful.

He then set his sights on the football reporters present.

Kobe McDonald has just finished school, but the Mayo young gun now has an All-Ireland medal and is set to come to the AFL.

When the final siren went on Sunday, it set off emotional scenes at Croke Park among the 80,000-plus crowd.

The Saw Doctors' hit The Green and Red of Mayo blasted out of the speakers at the stadium as joy mixed with disbelief for the fans.

After the game, McDonald was elated and trying to focus on the now, rather than what's next.

"Look, to be honest I'm not thinking about Australia right now. I'm just going to soak in every minute of this," he told Irish broadcaster RTE.

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"I know every team probably says it but we're like a family. When we're in training three days a week it's like 40 brothers."

"We know every single person in there has each other's back and whatever is being said outside the group doesn't affect us."

Gaelic games, football and hurling, are amateur sports, and there has been plenty of debate over the years about the loss of talent to the AFL.

The rest of Mayo hopes that McDonald stays with Mayo and doesn't take his skills to Australia.

But whatever happens from here, McDonald and the rest of the team have written their names in Irish sporting history.

A huge crowd of Mayo supporters travelled to Dublin and were overjoyed after their team's shock win.

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