*St Joseph’s Spanish Point celebrate their Munster success.
HAVING bagged the Munster and Clare colleges senior A ladies football titles in recent weeks, St Joseph’s Spanish Point are hoping to qualify for an All-Ireland decider.
Tuam stadium is the venue for their All-Ireland semi-final tilt with Leinster champions, Moate Community school and the throw in is set for 2p.m.
Principal of the school and manager of the ladies football side, Paul Reidy accepts that Moate carry the favouries tag. “They are the kingpins of ladies football in Leinster. They have won the last two minor A’s the last two junior A’ and they won the last senior A title. They are the current All-Ireland junior champions and they are through to the All-Ireland final in this grade again this year”.
Speaking to The Clare Echo, Paul said, “five of their junior A side are starting on their senior team” before adding “our players will give it everything, they are a very honest group”.
Preparations have been difficult for Spanish Point due to the involvement of their players on several county squads. “It was difficult for a while after the Munster win to get everything together due to players being involved with four different Clare squads. We had players involved with four different Clare teams. In fact, only three of our players were not involved with Clare. The county minors and under 16’s only played last week. Winning the county final against St Flannan’s will, hopefully, be an advantage. Thankfully we have no injury worries at this time”.
Reidy continued, “this is massive for the school and for West Clare. We have over 200 pupils travelling to support the team and together with the families of the players and supporters from the area we will have good support. It’s the first time a team from the school will compete at this stage of the competition in almost thirty years. With just 200 girls in the school to be competing at this level is unbelievable”, he said before adding “we can’t field a first year girls team this year. A lot don’t play the game”.
A contribution of 2-7 from Ellie Hanrahan helped the Clare side to the Munster title when they defeated Mercy Clonmel on a 4-12 to 3-13 scoreline. They will be hoping that the Kilmurry Ibrickane player can lead the charge again this week along with Abbie Gallagher, Abi Kelly, Ide O’Connor, Aisha and Aoibhinn Ryan to mention a few.
Victory in this semi-final will result in an All-Ireland final appearance two weeks later against either Claregalway or Belfast.
Should Spanish Point and Claregalway qualify for the decider it will lead to much debate in the Kilmihil parish in particular as the opposing coaches in such a situation will be Kilmihil people. The Claregalway coach is Ellie O’Gorman, a key member of the Kilmihil ladies club while Paul is also a prominent member of the Kilmihil club and is joined on the management by Eimear Considine, a teammate of Ellie’s at club and formerly county.
For now, however, the focus is fully on this Thursday’s semi-final and while Spanish Point are facing a huge task they have shown throughout the season that they can match the best.
