Mayo will play Dublin or Kerry in next month’s All-Ireland football final but victory came at a cost against Tyrone at Croke Park on Sunday.
Star forward Cillian O’Connor lasted just 11 minutes of the 1-16 to 0-13 win over the Ulsermen before a shoulder injury ended his involvement.
The freescoring attacker is now all but ruled out of the All-Ireland decider as Mayo seek to avenge last year’s defeat to Donegal in the final.
O’Connor was taken to the nearby Mater Hospital with a suspected dislocated shoulder.
A statement issued by the Mayo County Board on Sunday night confirmed: “Cillian has suffered a suspected dislocated shoulder on the same shoulder he injured last year.
“His condition will be monitored closely over the next few days but his participation in the All-Ireland final on 21 September is now in serious doubt.”
Boss James Horan also admitted O’Connor will struggle to make the final.
Horan said: “It doesn’t look good for Cillian but we will give him as much time as he needs.”
Tyrone led by a point at half-time, 0-7 to 0-6, but an early second-half penalty, converted by Alan Freeman, changed the course of the game.
Manager Horan said afterwards: “We started off particularly poorly, we looked slow and lethargic and Tyrone raced into a lead and we were just hanging in for, maybe, the first 20 minutes of the first half.
“We got to grips with it and sorted it out and started to grind it out. The last ten minutes of the first half were good, Christy Barrett went up and got a few great scores for us to give us a bit of momentum going into half-time.
“We had a chat about it at half-time, what we needed to do and we came out and in the first ten minutes of the second half we just played like we could and just took over the game.
“We were just very poor in the first half, we were too slow moving on the ball, we were running into traffic, talking wrong options and that sometimes happens when your focus is a little bit off.
“We tried to go back to basics and move the ball like we can. We got a couple of runs and Freeser [Alan Freeman] stuck away the penalty very well and we were in control from then on.”
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