*Ciara McCarthy and Patrick O’Connor celebrate. Photograph: Burren Eye Photography
BEFORE THEY took on the job as Kilmurry Ibrickane joint managers Patrick O’Connor and Niall Hickey believed there was a senior title in the ladies footballers.
That belief became a reality on Sunday as they recorded a 3-8 1-10 win over St Joseph’s Doora/Barefield in Cusack Park to win the senior title for the very first time in their history.
Making the breakthrough is huge for the club, joint manager O’Connor outlined. “it’s massive and it’s the first in the history of the ladies club, it’s been a tough eighteen months but myself and Niall (Hickey) always believed we could win a senior championship and we told them when we met them eighteen months ago that was the goal and we got there. We don’t have a big panel either but nothing separated us again, we’ve played three or four times the last year but there is always a point or two in it, if their goal in the first half was allowed then there would have been nothing in this either”.
He told The Clare Echo it was the calibre of footballer in their ranks that made him confident they had what it takes to win a senior championship. “They have the talent, look at Chloe, Amy, Ciara McCarthy, the two Doohans and Ciara Hickey another massive asset back from America, we had saw the U16s and minors in Kilmurry Ibrickane and we thought if we could get four or five of them through that they would get there, the likes of Kayla Darcy, Niamh Miller, Aoife Martin, Ellie Hanrahan, the list goes on, we thought if we could get them into the senior panel and playing with girls that they would get there, we believed we had a strong twenty”.
O’Connor added, “It’s massive, we’ve done the long drives to training and there was times at the start of the year that we had seven or eight training when Clare were training, there was times driving thirty five or forty minutes back to Seafield Beach and only four or five girls training but the moment Clare got beat by Tyrone the first five girls to show up to training for us were the five county girls and from there on we drove on, it’s been a good three months and we always believed we could win, I told them in the dressing room against West Clare Gaels that if we could beat West Clare Gaels we would win the senior championship and we did”.
Both O’Connor and Hickey did their homework off the field and managed to curb the influence of Eabha O’Driscoll who had been one of the top performers of the championship. He revealed that they implemented drills in training specifically focused on limiting the involvement of the Doora/Barefield teenager. “I harped on about her for the last two weeks at training and on Friday night I did games about Eabha O’Driscoll to be straight up and honest with you, I know how good she is, I saw her in the group game against us and I’ve watched her with the Clare minors, I believe she is one of the best county minors in the country and I told that to the girls, we knew if we stopped her that we would win, that is being honest”.
