From a personal point of view it has been a good season for Tomas Corrigan. He finished as Fermanagh’s top scorer in the championship with 0-29 in his team’s four games and was a thorn in the side of numerous defences over the course of the year.
On Saturday night he was again in menacing form and had led the Mayo defence on a merry dance during the first half and only the ammunition dried up in the second half Corrigan would no doubt have landed more telling blows on the men from the West. Reflecting on the loss to Mayo 48 hours after the dust had settled the Fermanagh forward was a mixture of frustration and optimism. First the frustration;
“It’s a tough on to take. We played so well for so long and when that happens it is the win that you want, not the glorious defeats that we have had so many of. I thought we deserved more out of the game given our performance and it is very disappointing.”
Turning his attention to the major talking point of the game Corrigan was in no doubt that Aiden O’Shea had pulled the wool over the eyes of Cavan referee Joe McQuillan in securing a penalty for his team with Corrigan suggesting that it may have been something of a home town decision;
“It was no penalty. The ref was conned by a fairly awful dive. Just like even in diving terms it was a really bad one, it wasn’t even a good dive. But he deceived the ref and the ref gave a penalty but these are the kind of decisions that are key, if the game was in Brewster Park we might have got it the other way.”
When Cillian O’Connor dispatched the penalty Mayo took a stranglehold on the game with five minutes left to play.  Two points up and with the aid of the strong breeze and all the momentum, the penalty proved decisive according to the former Kinawley club man;
“It was a massive score with a couple of minutes left. You can hypothesise about what way the game would have went had the penalty not went in but the fact is that in any game a penalty scored changes the course of the game and that is not up for discussion. Whether we would have held out is irrelevant. The penalty was given and the game was decided on it.”
Fermanagh left Castlebar dejected but as the initial raw disappointment began to dull Corrigan was able to take some solace in the performance of Fermanagh, especially in the first half;
“You have to factor in that we were playing no mugs. Mayo are a division one team on their home patch and we were well worth our lead of six points at half time and the way we responded to their goal was pleasing.”
Fermanagh’s defeat to Mayo saw a bowing of the championship at round two of the qualifiers and on the face of it this would indicate something of a slip in form from the heights of All Ireland quarter final last year. 
But that would be an unfair and lazy analysis of what has been a positive year for the county.
This very point is something that Corrigan reflected upon and when assessing the season as a whole the corner forward is sure that he and his teammates are heading in the right direction but believes that it is vital that they learn the harsh lessons dealt to them by defeat to division one side’s Donegal and Mayo in the championship;
“I think one of the positives that we have to take is that we are taking steps forward all the time. And those defeats hopefully when we look back in a couple of years time you can look back with an Ulster medal and say that you learned so much from those defeats and those got us to where we are. So it’s important that we don’t forget about that match against Mayo, we have to take those lessons that we have learned and use them.”
Erne boss Pete McGrath has served three years at the helm but it is pretty obvious that the Fermanagh players want the Down native back in charge again as they go in search of tangible success;
“Obviously Pete is his own man and will make his own decision. From the players perspective continuity is very important. When a new manager comes in it takes a year for everything to get up and running properly and we just don’t have that time. We are in a good place and we are getting there and we have to keep going the way we are,” Corrigan explained.
Fermanagh supporters will no doubt agree that McGrath and indeed this squad stay together to work to make that next step on the journey.