Keith Higgins feels that the manner in which Mayo responded to the concession of two own goals in the first half of their drawn All-Ireland final shows the mental strength of the side.
25 minutes into the drawn game no Dublin player had scored and yet the men from the capital led thanks to two fortunate, or unfortunate depending on your outlook, own goals from Kevin McLaughlin and Colm Boyle.
Speaking to RTÉ Sport, the all star defender admitted that in previous years that could have been the end of the Mayo challenge.
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However, he points out that they "responded well, so maybe that comes down to the mental strength of the team."
Mayo did respond well, and eventually came from three points down with normal time almost up to tie things up at the death.
Higgins said seeing the sideline official indicate seven minutes of additional time was a blessing for his side.
"When the 7 minutes went up on the board it took away any bit of panic we had. We knew we had time and we just kept chipping away at it."
Cillian O'Connor's point in the 77th minute is already written into Mayo GAA folklore, but despite its significance the players didn't know quite how to feel coming off the field.
"Straight after the game it’s probably a mixture of emotions really - you’re disappointed you didn’t win it but at the same time you’re relieved you’re still there.
"Once you settle down and think about it everyone’s just delighted to have another crack at it."
Unsurprisingly, Dublin are the favourites to win the next day and secure back-to-back All-Ireland titles for the first time since 1977.
While the weight of public opinion would suggest the Dubs will up their game for the replay, the Ballyhaunis man is unperturbed.
"I suppose a lot of people are saying they’re not going to play as bad the next day – we’ll havta wait and see.
"From our point of view we’re just going to focus on ourselves. We feel we didn't play particularly well the last day so a lot of work on and hopefully we can improve on that the next day."
As regards areas where Mayo can improve, Higgins echoed his managed Stephen Rochford in highlighting the amount of turnovers given up by his side.
"I think the turnovers the last day probably killed us," he said.
"From our point of view there’s definitely still room to improve"
"I know it was a slippy day and greasy but it was the same for both teams. We gave away a lot of ball very easily so that’s going to be one crucial area we’ll havta work on."
While the opinion is Dublin did not perform, Mayo have been struggling to put together a solid 70 minute performance all year.
"From our point of view there’s definitely still room to improve," Higgins claims.
"All year I don't think we've got the type of performances that we’ve been looking for. We’ve probably done it in patches but not done it consistently enough.
"The last day was the same really - we done well at times but overall I don’t think we hit the heights we’d hoped for so we just have to hope we can do that the next day."
No doubt the entire population of Mayo is hoping the same.
