Libby Coppinger pride as Junior C St Colum’s represented on camogie’s biggest day

Libby Coppinger's West Cork club, St Colum’s, only began offering camogie in 2009

Katie Power of Kilkenny in action against Libby Coppinger of Cork at Croke Park in Dublin. Photo by Piaras Ó Mídheach/Sportsfile

The instruction from Libby Coppinger, after she apologises for not being more prompt in replying to an earlier text, is to ring the Coppinger landline.

No apology was necessary on the part of the Cork full-back. She can hardly be blamed for the poor service that meant this writer’s text message did not land into her phone until an hour and a half after it was sent.

“Reception down here is terrible,” she says, before joking: “There are times Paudie Murray thinks I am ignoring him because I mightn’t get his text for a day or two after he sends it.”

“Down here” is home. Home is Coomhola in West Cork, a short spin from both Glengarriff and Bantry for those not au fait with the local geography.

“Down here” is also football country. And while Libby is most proficient with a size 4 O’Neill’s in hand, it’s camogie that holds sway for this particular conversation.

“We are not known for our camogie in West Cork, we’re known more for our football down that direction,” said Coppinger’s Cork teammate and Enniskeane native Orla Cronin when accepting the player of the match award following the county’s 2017 All-Ireland final win.

Newcestown’s Ciara O’Sullivan is the latest West Cork addition to Paudie Murray’s starting team, but marking Libby out is her against-the-odds journey that has taken the 25-year-old within an hour of a third All-Ireland senior camogie medal.

Before detailing said journey, context is necessary: Coppinger’s Cork teammates Katrina and Pamela Mackey pocketed their first All-Ireland senior medals in the same year — 2009 — as Libby’s home club, St Colum’s, began offering camogie.

With no camogie club in existence when taking her first steps with a hurley in hand, her early education in the game was as part of underage hurling teams fielded by St Colum’s. Lining out with the lads, though, was not a runner as she progressed up through the age grades, so she is eternally grateful to those who got a camogie club off the ground as she entered her teenage years.

“My uncle Tony Coppinger and a lot of other people locally got the camogie club going in 2009. They have been so good in putting as much time into it as possible and getting St Colum’s on the map in camogie circles.

“It would be small enough numbers-wise and we didn’t have a junior team until a couple of years ago. But it is great for underage players just to have the option of playing camogie.

“Enniskeane is probably the closest camogie club to us and that is still 40 minutes away. We have a couple of girls coming from Adrigole, Castletownbere direction and we have one girl coming to us from Goleen. They are travelling a distance, but it is great that they have somewhere they can go and play camogie.”

Low playing numbers in the early years of their existence saw St Colum’s amalgamate with Clonakilty at U16 and minor, this partnership allowing Libby to line out for Clon’s adult team before Colum’s fielded their own junior side.

“I’ve toured around the place,” laughs the affable dual star.

With the Kealkill club operating in the lower grades and far away from centre stage, invitations to county trials were simply non-existent. She played no U14 or U16 with Cork and it wasn’t until her final year minor that a call came to go present herself in Cloughduv for a trial match.

“I remember going over and being half nervous because you’d expect everyone else to kinda know each other and you’d be the new person on the scene.”

From first-time Cork minor in 2014, she was introduced as a second-half substitute in the All-Ireland senior final two years later. Coppinger has been a first-team regular since the following 2017 season, playing in a variety of defensive roles. The most recent of which sees her wearing the number three shirt.

“The Cork minors was the first proper taste of, ‘oh my God, this is so enjoyable to be at this standard, pushing yourself, and being around such talented players’. It grew my love for it even more.

“You would always have dreamed of playing with Cork. But because I was playing football more throughout my life, from a younger age I would have said that is the more realistic option for me. Camogie was definitely a shock but one I was very happy to be a part of.

“It wasn’t a case of I never wanted it, it was more a case of I don’t know if that would ever happen for me. That it has has been a real bonus.”

Tomorrow will be another proud day for St Colum’s, a Junior C West Cork club represented on camogie’s biggest day.

When trying to grow a sport in a particular area, it’s a sizable help to have a local who has ascended to the game’s top level.

“I am still in a little bit of denial about it,” she says of her role model status down around Kealkill.

“Those involved in St Colum’s are so good, they’d be saying to the girls, ‘Libby is playing, there is no reason you can’t be playing’. It is definitely great to have people close to home that are doing it and showing others that it is possible.

“If we can inspire only one or two girls to dream big and get there, you’d hope in a couple more years there might be more girls from St Colum’s representing Cork at different age levels. That’d be great and I’d be happy to be a little part in that.”