The 2026 All-Ireland Senior Football Championship final was a Gaelic football match played at Croke Park in Dublin on 26 July 2026 between Kerry and Mayo, the culmination of the 2026 season. It was the 139th final of that sport's primary competition, the All-Ireland Senior Football Championship.

Kerry, the reigning title holder from 2025 and 2026 Munster Senior Football Championship winner, faced Mayo in what was a first meeting of the teams at this stage of the competition since 2006. Mayo defeated heavy favourites Kerry by a total of three points, with a score of 1–20 (23) to 1–17 (20) (see scoring notation). This was Mayo's first All-Ireland SFC title in 75 years, and a fourth overall.

The match was broadcast live on The Sunday Game Live on RTÉ2 television and on the RTÉ Player, presented by Joanne Cantwell with analysis from Peter Canavan, Tomás Ó Sé and Lee Keegan. Match commentary was provided by Marty Morrissey and Éamonn Fitzmaurice. It was also broadcast live by BBC Two Northern Ireland and on the BBC iPlayer.

The match drew an average TV audience of 944,000 viewers on RTÉ2, representing an 82% share of the available audience, and peaked at 1,100,000 towards the end of the game.

Background

This was the fifth meeting of Mayo and Kerry in the All-Ireland SFC final, with Kerry being victorious in all four previous meetings, those of 1932, 1997, 2004 and 2006.

Kerry, the most successful county in the competition's history, entered the game with 39 previous titles. They had won 7 of the previous 22 editions of the tournament, including those of 2022 and 2025. Kerry were therefore strong favourites to win the title, with journalists describing it as a David and Goliath contest. Betting markets predicted Kerry to win by 4 points.

Mayo's previous title win was in 1951. Since then they had been runners-up 11 times, losing the finals of 1989, 1996, 1997, 2004, 2006, 2012, 2013, 2016, 2017, 2020 and 2021. Mayo's long losing streak gave rise to a legend that the team had been cursed in 1951 known as the 'Curse of '51' or the 'Mayo Curse'. Supposedly because the celebrating team had passed a funeral procession without showing due respect. According to a version of that legend, the priest placed a curse on the team, which would prevent Mayo from winning the All-Ireland SFC title again until all the players involved in 1951 had passed away. The last surviving player from that game Paddy Prendergast died on 26 September 2021, shortly after Mayo lost that year's final. This left Mike Loftus as the last surviving panel member from 1951 (he did not play); Loftus died at the age of 93 on 22 April 2023.

The last Sunday in July is Reek Sunday, when pilgrims traditionally climb Croagh Patrick, a mountain in County Mayo, and this was the first time that Mayo played an All-Ireland final on Reek Sunday, as the All-Ireland SFC final was traditionally played in September until 2022. The unprecedented clash between these two cultural events was expected to affect attendances.

Paths to the final Kerry won the 2026 Munster Senior Football Championship final for the sixth year running. After a heavy defeat in Killarney to Donegal, Kerry then went on an unbeaten run to the final.

Mayo's 2026 Connacht Senior Football Championship campaign ended at the semi-final stage, with a loss to Roscommon, which also left Mayo more time than Kerry to prepare for the All-Ireland series. Nevertheless, they still lost one game, to 2021 All-Ireland SFC winners .

+ KerryRound Date Opponent Venue () Result Victorymargin Score Ref Munster SFC semi-final 25 April 2026 Cusack Park, Ennis (A) Win 8 2–19 to 1–14 Munster SFC final 10 May 2026 Fitzgerald Stadium (H) Win 81–23 to 1–15 Round 1 23 May 2026 Fitzgerald Stadium (H) Loss –100–16 to 2–20 Round 2B 13 June 2026 St Conleth's Park (A) Win 14 3–22 to 0–17 Round 3 20 June 2026 Fitzgerald Stadium (H) Win 13 4–18 to 0–17 Quarter-final 27 June 2026 Croke Park (N) Win 4 2–25 to 0–27 Semi-final 12 July 2026 Croke Park (N) Win 4 2–18 to 0–20

+ MayoRound Date Opponent Venue () Result Victorymargin Score Ref Connacht SFC quarter-final 11 April 2026 McGovern Park (A) Win 130–31 to 1–15 Connacht SFC semi-final 26 April 2026 McHale Park (H) Loss –10 1–18 to 2–25 Round 1 31 May 2026 St Tiernach's Park (A) Win 11–24 to 2–20 Round 2A 14 June 2026 Healy Park (A) Loss –1 1–18 to 0–22 Round 3 20 June 2026 McHale Park (H) Win 30–22 to 2–13 Quarter-final 27 June 2026 Croke Park (N) Win 5 0–23 to 0–18 Semi-final 11 July 2026 Croke Park (N) Win 17 3–23 to 0–15

Pre-match 18-year-old Mayo forward Kobe McDonald had signed a pre-contract with St Kilda of the Australian Football League and was thus expected to be playing his last game for Mayo, with he and his family expected to move to Australia after Kobe finished his Leaving Certificate exams. Members of the Saints scouting staff were in attendance for the final, and McDonald wrote the phrase "One Chance" on his wrist tape as motivation.

As usual with Mayo attendance in an All Ireland the demand for tickets was off the charts and ratcheted up in the lead up to the match. In the build-up to the final, Belmullet super supporter John Shevlin attracted media attention after painting his house in Mayo's green and red colours. Shevlin was already known for driving a green-and-red Ford Focus bearing an "Up Mayo" message as his daily driver, which he had taken to Mayo's championship match against London in Ruislip earlier in the season.

Television RTÉ2 broadcast the match live on The Sunday Game Live with coverage beginning at 2.15pm. The programme was presented by Joanne Cantwell who was joined by analysts Lee Keegan, Niall Morgan, Peter Canavan and Tomás Ó Sé. Commentary on the game was by Marty Morrissey and Éamonn Fitzmaurice.

The match was also broadcast live by BBC Two Northern Ireland with coverage beginning at 3pm. Sarah Mulkerrins presented the programme and was joined by Oisín McConville, Philly McMahon, Killian Young and Pádraig O'Hora for analysis. Match commentary was provided by Thomas Niblock along with Conor McManus.

RTÉ2's coverage was also simulcasted around the world via GAA+, the GAA's paid streaming service.

Officials On 15 July the GAA announced that the referee for the Final would be Martin McNally of Monaghan. It was his first time reffing the All-Ireland final having been Standby Official for the 2025 final. His Line Umpires were Seán Hurson of Tyrone, who was the Standby Official, and Thomas Murphy of Galway. Seán Lonergan of Tipperary was the Sideline Official while Killian Jones (Kildare) was the Hawk-eye Official and Marty Duffy (Sligo) the Timekeeper.

Colours Both counties' traditional colours required one county to wear a change strip; with both counties also having a predominantly blue clash jersey it was agreed that a coin toss would be used to decide who would wear their home kit and who would change. Kerry won the toss and wore their traditional green and gold kit. Kerry's 2026 kit is a darker shade of green than previous years and it was deemed to conflict with Mayo's navy alternative kit; as a result, Mayo wore a one-off all-white kit similar to what they wore when they last won the All-Ireland SFC title in 1951. The kit was based on a 75th anniversary tribute shirt Mayo had worn during their 2026 League campaign, except with their modern crest replacing a period-appropriate badge and the current sponsors Intersport Elverys printed on the front and Portwest printed on the back.

Team selection On the Thursday before the final manager Jack O'Connor named the same starting 15 players that started the semi-final against , with captain Paul Geaney returning to the matchday squad on the bench.

named their team the following day with Andy Moran making one change to the starting line-up from their semi-final victory over as Conor Loftus replaced Paul Towey.

Both sides had late injuries on the day of the game, with Mayo losing Stephen Coen (replaced by Diarmuid O'Connor). John MacMonagle took O'Connor's place on the bench. Mayo also started Paul Towey instead of Conor Loftus. Kerry replaced the injured Diarmuid O'Connor with Tom O'Sullivan, whose place on the bench went to Cillian Trant.

As Kerry captain Paul Geaney started on the bench, David Clifford was selected to act as captain on the field.

Sponsorship protest David Hickey, a three-time All-Ireland SFC winner with Dublin, refused to attend the GPA's "Legends Lunch", a commemoration of the 50th anniversary of Dublin's 1976 championship-winning team. Hickey, along with others protested at Jones' Road prior to the game against the GAA's continued sponsorship relationship with Allianz, arguing that the GAA had failed to oppose the company's indirect links to Israel.

Jubilee team Prior to the start of the match the Galway team of 2001 was presented to the crowd to mark the 25th anniversary of their All-Ireland title win over Meath. Their manager that day was John O'Mahony of Mayo. Galway's Paul Clancy, who had died the previous month (on 22 June), was represented by his son Finn.

Match Had the match finished level after the regulation 70 minutes, extra-time of 20 minutes (two 10-minute halves) were to have been played. Had the scores still been level after this, a replay was to take place on 8 August.

Summary After 16 minutes, Kerry led by a scoreline of 1–5 to 0–1, David Clifford scored the goal for Kerry in the 15th minute when he received a pass on the right before cutting in and going past the Mayo goalkeeper before finishing to the net. David McBrien had got Mayo's solitary seventh-minute point. Mayo, who had led the All-Ireland series in two-point scores, found going tough early as they kicked towards Hill 16 in the first half with multiple efforts from beyond the arc dropping short. The momentum would eventually shift during the second quarter of the game as Mayo's pressure allowed them to win the ball from kick-outs and chip away at Kerry's advantage; Kerry led at half-time by a scoreline of 1–8 to 0–10, the pick of Mayo's scores the respective two-pointers of Ryan O'Donoghue and Jack Carney.

In the second half Mayo dominated possession and it was Kobe McDonald who put Mayo ahead for the first time, the score 0–12 to 1–8. In the 40th minute, Darragh Beirne scored a goal for Mayo following a well-worked passage of play to extend the advantage to four points. Jack Carney would later hit another two-pointer to give Mayo a five-point cushion, their biggest lead of the day. Mayo's shooting touch would run cold, though, with multiple wides opening the door for Kerry to mount a comeback. With three minutes to go, David and Paudie Clifford had succeeded in bringing Kerry to within two points, with the score at 1–19 to 1–17. Kerry had several chances to draw level late, including a missed two-pointer by Seán O'Shea, and with less than a minute Mayo took advantage of Kerry's aggressive offensive shape to gain possession and head on the break. Kobe McDonald elected not to take the ball to the corner and run out the clock but instead passed it off to Tommy Conroy, who would fist over an insurance score with practically no time left for Kerry to reply. Mayo won by a scoreline of 1–20 to 1–17.

Mayo substitute Rory Brickenden had to swap the number 18 jersey he was mistakenly wearing for the correct number 19 jersey in the 55th minute of the game. The number 18 jersey belonged to Paddy Durcan.

Details

GK 1 Jack LivingstoneFB 2 Jack Coyne (c)FB 3 Donnacha McHughFB 4 Eoin McGreal HB 5 Sam Callinan HB 6 David McBrienHB 7 Enda HessionMF 8 Bob Tuohy MF 9 Jack CarneyHF 24 Diarmuid O'Connor HF 23 Paul Towey HF 12 Jordan Flynn FF 13 Darragh BeirneFF 14 Ryan O'DonoghueFF 15 Kobe McDonaldSubstitutes: 16 Rob Hennelly 17 Fenton Kelly 18 Paddy Durcan 19 Rory Brickenden 20 Conal Dawson 21 Aidan O'Shea 22 Matthew Ruane 11 Conor Loftus 10 John MacMonagle 25 Tommy Conroy 26 Cian McHaleManager:Andy Moran