diff --git a/.github/download-ROOT-source.sh b/.github/download-ROOT-source.sh
index 96534190..c3be0cde 100755
--- a/.github/download-ROOT-source.sh
+++ b/.github/download-ROOT-source.sh
@@ -7,25 +7,30 @@ if [ $# -ne 1 ]; then
   echo "USAGE: $0 [TAG]" >&2
   exit 1
 fi
-
 tag=$1
-curl_cmd='curl --silent -L -H "Accept: application/vnd.github+json" -H "X-GitHub-Api-Version: 2022-11-28"'
 
-echo DEBUG
-$curl_cmd https://api.github.com/repos/root-project/ROOT/releases/latest | jq
-exit 1
+get_payload() {
+  curl --silent -L -H "Accept: application/vnd.github+json" -H "X-GitHub-Api-Version: 2022-11-28" $1
+}
 
-echo "Download ROOT tag '$tag' from:"
+echo "================================="
 case $tag in
   latest)
-    url=$($curl_cmd https://api.github.com/repos/root-project/ROOT/releases/latest | jq -r '.tarball_url')
+    payload=$(get_payload https://api.github.com/repos/root-project/ROOT/releases/latest)
+    echo $payload | jq
+    url=$(echo $payload | jq -r '.tarball_url')
     ;;
   *)
-    url=$($curl_cmd https://api.github.com/repos/root-project/ROOT/tags | jq -r '.[] | select (.name=="'$tag'") | .tarball_url')
+    payload=$(get_payload https://api.github.com/repos/root-project/ROOT/tags)
+    echo $payload | jq
+    url=$(echo $payload | jq -r '.[] | select (.name=="'$tag'") | .tarball_url')
     ;;
 esac
 
-echo "  $url"
-[ -z "$url" ] && echo "ERROR: GitHub API call returned empty string, perhaps tag '$tag' does not exist?" && exit 1
+echo "================================="
+echo "Download ROOT tag '$tag' from:"
+echo "  URL = $url"
+echo "used jq version: $(jq --version)"
+[ -z "$url" -o "$url" = "null" ] && echo "ERROR: GitHub API payload parsing failed, perhaps tag '$tag' does not exist?" && exit 1
 echo "downloading ..."
-wget -nv --no-check-certificate --output-document root.tar.gz $url
+# exec wget -nv --no-check-certificate --output-document root.tar.gz $url