Galvin’s GAA fame ‘made love life tricky’

Radio star Louise Duffy has revealed how the fame of her GAA boyfriend Paul Galvin initially made her reluctant to date him.

The Today FM presenter also revealed she shared a love of clothes with the fashionista sports star.

The 28-year-old jokingly referred to herself as a WAG on the Ray D’Arcy Show yesterday but said she didn’t like the term.

The presenter of the station’s early morning show told her colleague that her boyfriend’s status as one of the country’s best-known GAA stars made her wary of a relationship.

“I always wanted a flamboyant boyfriend,” Louise joked.

“I suppose he would be well-known. That side of things was a bit tricky at the start and you sort of shy away from it because it’s your personal life and everything.

“People know them. You kind of don’t want that for your personal life, you want your personal life to be private as much as possible. When they are in the limelight like that you have to be a little bit more cautious. You get past it. It’s fine. It’s a consideration at the start.”

The Mayo presenter said she was surprised over by the level of attention around the Kerry footballers in their home county.

“I can’t believe how much so,” she said. “You would feel it a little bit because, God, I could streak from one end of Grafton St to another and no one knows me but when I’m with him in Kerry, especially, the footballers are so popular down there and they would be approached for pictures and that kind of thing.”

Despite her boyfriend’s famous sense of style, she said he would never criticise her choice of fashion.

“He wouldn’t dream of it. It’s very amicable in that regard. I like what he wears and I hope the same can be said of [me].”

Louise said the pair met almost a year ago “through friends” and have been “going out about 10 months”.

She said she would probably be able to spend more time when he hung up his boots.

She said she has learned to leave her boyfriend on his own when he suffered the disappointment of being knocked out of big games.

“They are training how many days a week, and the matches. They just give so much to it, so when they lose then it is devastating.

“We would have our quiet time. When they’ve been going for it and they are training so hard and it all ends that bit too quickly, you have to come to terms with that as well.

“There is a period of ‘I’ll let you at it there for a while’. Then they pull themselves together and it’s on to the next one really, isn’t it?”