Meath complete meteoric rise as first-ever All-Ireland title ends Dublin's five-in-a-row hopes
Meath's Katie Newe, left, and Emma Duggan celebrate. Photo by Eóin Noonan/Sportsfile
A remarkable Emma Duggan goal separated the teams at Croke Park as 6/1 underdogs Meath secured an astonishing TG4 All-Ireland senior ladies football title success.
It's just nine months since Eamonn Murray's side won the intermediate title before promptly clearing the stage on that occasion for Dublin to take on Cork in the 2020 senior final.
Dublin won that game to secure the four-in-a-row and were giant favourites to win their 26th consecutive championship game and to hold onto the Brendan Martin Cup.
But in one of the great upsets of the ladies championship, they never led in this final and trailed from the fifth minute of the game until full-time.
Duggan's sixth-minute goal, a spectacular lobbed effort that beat the goalkeeper after a turnover on the Dublin kick-out, gave Meath a cushion that they carried throughout.
Duggan only received her Leaving Cert results on Friday but finished with 1-1 and turned in a huge display.
Vikki Wall oozed quality too and there were massive performances from Emma Troy and Niamh O'Sullivan while Shauna Ennis became the first-ever Meath captain to lift the trophy.
Meath led by five points at half-time and while Dublin rallied in the second half, they couldn't get any closer than two points.
Dublin manager Mick Bohan talked beforehand about craving a final performance the team could be truly proud of.
He admitted that the dressing-room after the 2019 final was actually 'muted' as the players felt that while they'd won, they'd won ugly.
It became very clear, very quickly this time that even an ugly win might be beyond them as Meath started at a breakneck pace, hitting Dublin with everything they had and rarely letting up.
Setting up in counter-attacking mode again, Meath got great joy from pressing high up on the Dublin kick-out in the first half.
They got a series of scores from literally cutting off all options for Ciara Trant's kick-outs and forcing the errors.
The big breakthrough was Duggan's sixth-minute goal when she seized on a breaking ball from a Trant kick-out and looped a shot from 25 metres out back over the goalkeeper's head.
Only Duggan knew if she was going for goal but it looked like she was and Meath were suddenly in pole position with a 1-2 to 0-1 lead.
When out of possession, Meath's basic game plan was to flood their defence and force turnovers, allowing Wall to burst upfield on a number of occasions.
Wall, on the team when Meath previously played Dublin in the Championship in 2016, losing that game by 16 points, was a powerful and, at times, unstoppable force.
She engineered Meath's opening point after just seconds with a brilliant run which earned a free that Stacey Grimes converted.
Troy, from the same Boardsmill club as Meath boss Murray, burst upfield from defence for two crucial first-half points.
O'Sullivan was an important player too though it was the understanding between Dunboyne colleagues Wall and Duggan that troubled Dublin's defence most.
Hannah Tyrrell, Ireland's leading points scorer in the Six Nations rugby championship earlier this year, was Dublin's key forward with 0-7 overall. She struck four of their first-half points but trailing by five points at half-time they were in real bother.
Tyrrell reduced the gap early in the second half with a fine point from distance and punched the air, partly in delight and partly to inspire her colleagues.
Dublin outscored Meath by 0-2 to 0-1 in the third quarter before reeling off three points in a row between the 48th and 50th minutes, Kate Sullivan, Tyrrell, and Lyndsey Davey all on the mark.
That reduced the gap to just two points and they would trail again by two again with as many minutes remaining late on.
But they couldn't get any closer as Meath held on for a famous win, becoming the 13th county to win the senior championship.
E Duggan (1-2); S Grimes (1 free), N O'Sullivan (0-3 each); E Troy (0-2); B Lynch (0-1).
H Tyrrell (0-7, 3 frees); S Aherne, M Byrne, C Rowe, K Sullivan, L Davey (0-1 each).
M McGuirk; E Troy, MK Lynch, K Newe; A Leahy, A Cleary, S Ennis; O Lally, M O'Shaughnessy; O Byrne, S Grimes, W Wall; N O'Sullivan, E Duggan, B Lynch.
M Thynne for Lynch & N Gallogly for Leahy (45); E White for O'Sullivan (58); S Melia for Lally (60).
C Trant; M Byrne, N Collins, L Caffrey; S Goldrick, S McGrath, O Nolan; J Dunne, L Magee; H Tyrrell, L Davey, C Rowe; S Aherne, N Hetherton, S Killeen.
C O'Connor for Hetherton (27); N McEvoy for Killeen (h/t) & O Carey for McGrath (h/t); K Sullivan for Nolan (45); A Kane for Davey (54).
B Rice (Down).
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