How the Connolly factory built girls football at Cork's College Corinthians

Many of the Ireland squad wore the shirts of their first grassroots club on Monday. Megan Connolly was among them, proudly wearing her Corinthians shirt

Wed, 19 Jul, 2023 - 06:45

Eoghan Cormican

Turner’s Cross. October 11, 2022.

The television in the Connolly sitting room has been a watched pot for 90 minutes. But while picture and sound continue to come through from Hampden Park, there’s nobody really paying attention anymore.

Mick Connolly is pacing and plotting. He’s been pacing the kitchen since Amber Barrett’s toe-poke. The ink has hardly dried on Ireland’s ticket to Australia and already Mick is planning a summer spent Down Under.

His wife, Freda, is bawling crying. Their daughter, Megan, the calmest individual on the couch during the 90 minutes of action, is now having a pinch-me moment. A metaphorical moment, mind. The lacerated kidney and fractured ribs that kept her at home from Hampden Park wouldn’t take kindly to pinching.

Older brother Luke is not long home from Nemo training. He got taken out of school to watch Ireland v Germany in the 2002 World Cup. Twenty years later, his baby sister is headed for the biggest show in women’s football.

He tries and fails to comprehend this bizarre reality.

The only missing character from the chaos and beauty that has enveloped the Connolly household is middle child Nicole.

For the Connolly family, the wheel came full circle that Tuesday night last October.

FAMILY AFFAIR: Megan Connolly of Republic of Ireland with her family after the women's international friendly match between Republic of Ireland and France at Tallaght Stadium. Pic: Stephen McCarthy/Sportsfile

It was in the same sitting room and kitchen that they sat as kids 15 years earlier preparing posters with their dad to try and get a girls' football team off the ground in College Corinthians.

Two weeks after Ireland’s play-off win on Clydeside, this writer sat down with Luke Connolly ahead of his own World Cup.

Nemo’s impending county final against the Barrs hardly got a look in. Megan dominated the conversation. Even Mick got more of a mention than Nemo’s southside rivals.

Luke’s point was this: Megan’s journey to Australia owed so much to their dad giving his youngest daughter a football road to set out on.

“As much as he made teams for girls and got girls involved in sport, and as great as that was, the main aim was to give Megan a team to play with to progress her career. And if she wanted to pursue it, to give her the best platform,” said Luke of his dad’s role in throwing open the gates of Corinthians Park to young girls back in 2008.

“You can see his enjoyment now. When Amber Barrett’s goal went in, he paced the kitchen and didn’t know what to do with himself.

“We are probably more happy for him than her, just because everything he wanted to happen has happened.”

In a recent interview before departing for Australia, Megan echoed her brother’s sentiments.

“Without him, I wouldn’t be here,” said the 26-year-old. “He gave me that ability to keep playing when there wasn’t that much local opportunities, and to play at a team and club that I really love.

“We kind of achieved it together as a family. I wouldn’t be here without them. I wouldn’t be at this point in my career without them.”

Mick Connolly took our call last Thursday morning. Nice and early too. He has a dentist appointment we won’t have him late for. One of the last few boxes to be ticked before himself and Freda turn the key in the door for three weeks. We hardly need to add where they’re off to.

Mick didn’t play much growing up. Work became the priority towards the end of his teenage years and he fell out of sport.

For his kids, he wanted a different story. They would and were given the full carvery.

Luke was thrown into swimming pools and thrown onto GAA and football fields. The girls too were treated to a full menu. There was ballet, modern dance, and music mixed in with football and ladies football.

“Megan, when she started off, was doing everything, but she had a natural ability for the soccer,” Mick begins.

He was already bringing Luke over to College Corinthians, so it made sense to pack Megan into the car too when spinning the short distance to Castletreasure. Problem was there was no girls' team. No problem at all. The U8 boys team for the 2005/06 season welcomed an outlier into their playpen.

“There were 30 or 40 fellas playing every Saturday morning and she was the only girl. She didn’t mind, though. Once she could participate, she didn't mind who she was kicking a ball with.

“If they were playing seven-a-side among themselves and a fella was brought out to pick a team, she'd be picked first. She could hold her own and was accepted within the group.”

But as obvious as Megan’s talents were from the outset, there was an expiry date on her time toiling with and tormenting the boys. There was no dressing-room seat for her beyond U11.

“I spoke with the committee in Corinthians and asked if I could try and get something going for girls. I said, ‘we'll put out a few flyers, have an open day for girls around the ages of 10 and 11, and give them a flavour of it.”

The making of those flyers remains a source of amusement in the Connolly household 15 years on. Around the kitchen table they all sat, cutting posters into the shape of a football. Arts and crafts, with a twist.

“They called it child slavery here, like. I called it flyers and posters,” laughs Mick.

“I got one printed and then photocopied about 100 of them from that. They'd be cutting them with the scissors, putting them into envelopes, and bringing them to school. They'd say, 'I am not doing that, it is too embarrassing'. But it served them well and it was a bit of fun too.”

Mick delivered them to all the local schools. Eglantine, Christ King, you name it.

The homemade flyers did the trick. Around 80 ponytails packed into Corinthians Park for the open day.

EARLY PROMISE: Megan Connolly gets away from Innisvilla no.5 Eleanor Murphy in the 2011 Ladies Under 14 soccer cup final at Turners Cross. Pic: Larry Cummins

From there, the girls' section swelled and stacked silverware. They won the U12 Cork Schoolgirls Premier League and Cup in their first season.

“It was full pitch. We played 4-4-2, but sure they all just hunted in packs at that age. The keepers were like dots in goal. It was roll on roll off, so you could use nearly 20 in a match. Organised chaos!”

U14, U16, and U18 honours followed after, culminating with Munster Senior Cup glory in 2014.

In their penalties victory over Wilton United in the decider, Megan scored both Corinthian goals in normal time and then went in goals for the shootout where she saved all three of Wilton’s spot-kicks. John McHale's report in the Evening Echo said Corinthians “are the closest I have ever seen to being a one-woman side.”

Six years on from his poster-making and ponytail-assembling endeavours, Mick was still on the sideline. But whatever about the playing side, it had long moved on from being a one-man organising effort. Even today, the girls' section continues to thrive. There's playing numbers to put out three teams at the various age groups.

“Corinthians is such a progressive club, I have to say that about them,” Mick continues.

“When we got that first U12 team registered, the club got in portable buildings as external dressing rooms for the girls. They got an external toilet in too.

“I wasn't popular, I must admit, because I was demanding this and demanding that. In fairness, the club saw the potential and facilitated it.

“Louise O'Regan, she and her daughter came in from Bandon, was a great help all the way through. Dave Dennehy was another. The parents were great. Neil Daly and Terry O'Donovan in the club were very, very helpful. Straightaway they were on board.”

At home, too, he found plenty of helping hands. Freda washed the jerseys, Megan laid out the cones before training.

“We were like a little factory working together. I'd have the teamsheet and I'd be bouncing off Megan saying what if we went this way and played that way. She was mad for it.

“It kinda stood to her. She's a tactical player now, as well, and is doing her badges. She has her UEFA B badge done. When your career ends, and it will end, she is going to try and stay in the sport and go coaching.”

The Connolly factory were back together on the night of Ireland’s historic play-off win. From cutting posters to World Cup planning.

“It was really nice for us all to be here and watch it. Her mother was bawling crying. Megan was emotional herself but didn't show it as much. She had to kinda pinch herself that we are finally going to a World Cup. From playing U8s with the boys in 2005 to a World Cup in 2023, it is brilliant.”

A father will never again have to make a flyer. A father will never again have to knock on the door of the local primary school, armed with notice of an open day for young girls. This World Cup and the journey to get there has made sure of that.

“If you were trying to start a team now, a single WhatsApp message would do it and you’d have 1,000 girls down at the pitch on Saturday morning.”

All the same, Megan will be forever grateful for her dad’s advertising and assembling efforts.

“Once you become a parent, it's never about yourself. It becomes all about them. You always want their dreams to happen for them. Once they realise their dreams, you are happy. A dream of Megan's has been to play at a World Cup. She now has the opportunity to tick that box. It’s brilliant.”

Watching from the stands in Sydney, Perth, and Brisbane will be the rest of the Connolly factory.