Watch: North Melbourne surprise Erika O'Shea by flying in parents ahead of AFLW Grand Final

The Cork native will be aiming to help North Melbourne land the silverware for the first time in their history.

Sat, 02 Dec, 2023 - 22:36

Andrew Horgan

Erika O'Shea has played in a number of huge matches already during her relatively short career but on Sunday the 21-year-old will compete in arguably the biggest game of her life.

The Macroom native helped Cork reach the All-Ireland Ladies football final in her debut season in 2020 while her performances in the 2021 campaign earned her an All-Star award.

In January 2022 she helped Glanmire win the National Cup in Basketball before the versatile athlete later decided to join AFLW side North Melbourne.

And now at the end of 2023, the year in which saw her make her debut Down Under, O'Shea is set to take part in the Grand Final against the Brisbane Lions were she will be aiming to help the Kangaroos land the trophy for the first time in their history.

Due to the significance of the game, which will kick off at 3.30am Irish time, the Aussie club went the extra mile to ensure some of the players' families were in attendance.

In Erika's case, the Kangaroos made the extra effort and paid the extra expense to ensure her parents travelled the 10,000 or so miles from Cork to Melbourne to be there on the day.

And to make it even sweeter for the O'Sheas, Erika didn't know anything about it until she turned around and saw her mother on the street in Melbourne.

The O'Sheas have made it all the way over 🌏

Dad's well rested, too 😂#Kangas | #JustYouWaitAndSee pic.twitter.com/88ScyT9i0D
— North Melbourne Women's (@NMFCWomens) December 2, 2023

In an interview with the Irish Examinerpreviously, Erika shared how big a role her parents had in helping her achieve her sporting dreams.

“My mam is very holy — she goes to mass every Sunday. There’s a saying that if you go to a new church you get a new wish, so the first year I was on the Cork team we’d go to a new church every week before a game, and wish that the match went well for Cork — we did that for a whole year straight,” she said at the time before adding that they had run out of churches in Cork.

“Hopefully, someone will build a few more for us for this season,” she laughed.

Hopefully Mrs O'Shea will have the chance to get to a church before the Grand Final kicks off.