Christy O'Connor: Can Kerry avoid the three-in-a-row nobody wants?
WHO WILL WIN: Kerry are in their third consecutive final and will be hoping to avoid three losses in a row with Galway in the final for the first time since 2019.Picture: Ben McShane/Sportsfile
On the day that Laois beat Mayo to finally win a first All-Ireland ladies senior title in 2001, Sue Ramsbottom was inevitably going to be the main focal point of attention afterwards. An immensely talented footballer, Ramsbottom was a pioneering figure in the evolution of the ladies game and its rise from obscurity into a mainstream sport. Yet the appeal of her story was forged more in heartbreak than glory.
Prior to that 2001 success, Ramsbottom had suffered seven All-Ireland final defeats, but those harrowing experiences made her even more determined to finally end the hurt. When Laois finally did, Ramsbottom was immense, scoring 7-17 over the course of that 2001 championship, but her most important contribution came in the final when she scored 0-4 from play, giving a young Laois side invaluable leadership in the process.
When Ramsbottom was interviewed live on TG4 just moments after the final whistle, she outlined the simplicity of her approach in her pursuit of ultimate glory. “If you don’t succeed at first,” said Ramsbottom, “try, try and try again.” Some of those defeats had been gut-wrenching, especially the 1996 final, which Laois lost to Monaghan after a replay. Yet the hardest of all was the loss to Kerry in 1993, which was Laois’s fourth successive final defeat.
No other county, or player, suffered that level of heartbreak in finals, but Dublin were put through some incredible pain in the middle of the last decade when losing three finals in-a-row to Cork. Two of those losses were one-point defeats, with the other by two points. That third defeat in succession, in 2016, was all the more devastating again when Carla Rowe had a point waved wide but TV replays showed that the ball had gone between the posts. Since HawkEye wasn’t in use on the day, the decision stood.
Now, Kerry are facing into their third final in-a-row, determined to end a 31 year-famine. And desperate to ensure that they don’t become the third team to experience the kind of heartbreak that Laois and Dublin suffered.
Whichever team wins the senior final on Sunday will be presented with the Brendan Martin Cup. So who is he? Martin grew up in Tullamore, becoming a quantity surveyor before starting his own construction company. While he was in Dublin, Martin became an active member of the Offaly Association in the capital.
The men arranged regular GAA training sessions in the Phoenix Park, which was mostly a way of getting together and keeping in touch. Then, in the early 70s, initially in ones and twos, but eventually in greater numbers, women began turning up. Martin’s interest in ladies football, and the potential of the game, began to grow.
Martin’s brother, Tom, had a house in Stradbally, Co Waterford. One weekend in 1973 he came back and said there were girls playing football down there. Martin was curious. He got in contact with a local priest, Fr Ahearne, and arranged for the Offaly Association in Dublin to take a team down to Stradbally to play a match.
Soon after, word reached Martin of another group training in Kerry. Frank Sweeney, who wrote The Offaly Rover, was married to Síle Ní Loingsigh, from Dingle, whose brother was training those girls. So Martin invited that side from Kerry up to Tullamore. On that August Bank Holiday in 1973, that match was unofficially billed as the first All-Ireland.
There were pockets of teams around the country playing the game by then in a growing movement and an ideal finally became a reality on July 18, 1974, when the Ladies Gaelic Football Association was founded in Hayes’ Hotel in Thurles. Martin was elected as assistant treasurer.
The LGFA didn’t have a cup at the time so Martin bought one at John J Cooke’s jewellers on Fownes Street in Dublin. On the 25th anniversary of the LGFA in 1999, Martin replaced it with a new trophy made at Kilkenny Castle by Des Byrne.
On the 50th anniversary of the LGFA, that’s the trophy will be handed over on Sunday. And that’s the story of the name behind it.
Over a year after Galway lost the 2019 All-Ireland final to Dublin, Cork hammered them in the 2020 semi-final and then Galway’s season crashed and burned at the All-Ireland quarter-final stage over the following three years. Some of those defeats were heartbreaking; Galway lost to Meath by one point in 2022; Mayo beat them by the same margin last year.
Galway were missing something, but Kilkerrin-Clonberne were building something special on the club scene, winning the last three All-Ireland titles. They knew what it took to win. Transferring it onto the county scene was a whole different challenge but Kilkerrin-Clonberne’s main players – Alish Morrissey, Nicola and Louise Ward, Olivia and Niamh Divilly - were gradually becoming the pillars of this Galway side.
Nicola Ward has developed into Galway’s best player. If Galway win, she will probably be Player-of-the-Year, but her sister Louise and Olivia Divilly are three of the main leaders driving this squad now.
They and the rest of their Kilkerrin-Clonberne team-mates on this squad know what it takes to win All-Irelands – especially in Croke Park. And they’ll be hoping now that their confidence rubs off on their team-mates on Sunday.
O’Shea back in a final with full peace of mind The Sunday before last year’s All-Ireland semi-final against Mayo, Síofra O’Shea tore her ACL at Kerry training, which was confirmed by an MRI scan the following day. The timing was devastating but it was all the more heartbreaking again coming just a year after O’Shea had returned from the same injury, on her other knee.
And then O’Shea started thinking what might happen, what could happen. The reaction was different this time around. Her knee wasn’t swollen or stiff. O’Shea could walk around freely and had her full range of motion, unlike the previous time. Could she possibly play in the final against Dublin? Being captain, O’Shea wanted to try and help in any way possible.
The Kerry management team made contact with Santry Sports Clinic and, suddenly, the option was viable. There was no guarantee that her knee would hold up, but O’Shea felt it was worth the risk. Either way, she was facing surgery in mid-September.
O’Shea went to Santry a number of times for testing. The week before the final, O’Shea played half a training game. Strapping and adrenaline would hopefully get her through however much of the match O’Shea could play. It did. She didn’t sustain any further damage after coming on as a 42nd minute sub but Kerry were chasing the game by then as Dublin were striding for the finishing line.
Almost a year to the day from suffering that injury last year, O’Shea was Player-of-the-Match against Armagh in the All-Ireland semi-final. A long year had finally come around. O’Shea can play this final now in full health. And with full peace of mind.
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