By Daire Walsh 

Having watched from afar as a familiar face from her childhood agonisingly missed out on guiding the county to an All-Ireland title last weekend, former Galway ladies footballer Aine McDonagh is hopeful another long-time acquaintance can go a step further in a similar quest at Croke Park tomorrow.

As a fellow native of Moycullen, McDonagh (currently in Australia preparing for a new AFLW season with Hawthorns) has known Galway men’s football captain Seán Kelly for many years. While a persistent injury prevented him from starting the game, the official skipper was introduced as a second half substitute in the Tribesmen’s dramatic one-point defeat to Armagh in last Sunday’s All-Ireland Senior Football Championship final.

Despite now playing her club football in Dublin with Kilmacud Crokes, Ailbhe Davoren also hails from Moycullen and was previously McDonagh’s team-mate on a host of underage and adult teams. A goalscorer in an impressive semi-final win over Cork, Davoren is set to captain the Galway ladies in their TG4 All-Ireland Senior Football Championship showpiece affair against Kerry at GAA HQ tomorrow.

“Sean and I actually went to school together, so I’ve known him from quite a young age. Just everything he has done for Moycullen and Galway over the past few years has been phenomenal,” McDonagh explained.

“He’s such a great role model for all the kids and the effort that he has put into Galway and Moycullen for the past couple of years is really commendable. It was tough going for him with injuries throughout the year. I’m disappointed that he couldn’t get it over the line.

“She (Davoren) has been there and thereabouts since right after minors. It’s great to see her going so well and being able to captain the team. It’s again just great for the parish that we had both captains of the men’s and women’s football being from Moycullen. From a small little parish. I’m delighted for her.”

Even though the time difference meant that it was in the early hours of Monday morning in Australia when the action got underway, McDonagh stayed up to see her native county taking on Armagh in a novel All-Ireland SFC decider. She is planning on doing the same for the showdown between her old side and the Kingdom this weekend - and is hoping to be joined by someone who has graced finals day in Croke Park on no fewer than eight occasions.

“I’m planning on watching it with a few of the girls here. I’m going to try and rope Sinead Goldrick into watching it. I’m not too sure how happy she will be to watch it with me! I’ll definitely be watching it,” McDonagh said.

When Galway last competed in a Brendan Martin Cup final back in 2019, a somewhat fortuitous Goldrick goal was crucial in helping Dublin to overcome the westerners in a low-scoring game at a rain-soaked Croke Park. McDonagh played the full 60 minutes of that game in midfield alongside Louise Ward, who remains a key figure in the current set-up.

The Kilkerrin-Clonberne ace and her twin sister Nicola are amongst a cohort of players in the Galway squad who have been part of the inter-county game for a considerable number of years and McDonagh believes claiming an All-Ireland SFC winners’ medal tomorrow would be just reward for their dedication to the cause of the Tribeswomen.

“I’m so happy for the girls who have been there and thereabouts for the past couple of years. The Wards and Olivia Divillys, and those likes. They’re such a credit to themselves and to Galway and their clubs, for all the work that they’ve done. They’ve just put in such tremendous work from such a young age.

“I know that they went onto the panel when they were maybe 16 years old and they’ve been there since. Ten years in thereabouts and I’m just delighted to see them getting back there again. They put in so much hard work and it would really top off a lot of their careers if they got over the line this weekend.”

Even though the result didn’t go their way, McDonagh described that All-Ireland defeat to Dublin in 2019, played in front of a record crowd of 56,114, as ‘a brilliant occasion’. Whilst her immediate future is in Australia, she does have an ambition of lining out in an All-Ireland final again.

Given the GAA pedigree in her family, it is little surprise that McDonagh would like to get her hands on a Celtic Cross at some point. In addition to her late uncle Mick Holden being an All-Ireland football winner with Dublin in 1983, her second cousins Brian Hogan and Joey Holden tasted Liam MacCarthy Cup success with the Kilkenny hurlers in the past.

“It was definitely a big occasion in 2019. We had kind of been knocking at the door for a couple of years and to finally get there was huge. Obviously on the day it was very disappointing not getting over the line. The weather wasn’t really great, but we came up against a really strong Dublin side.

“They were just better on the day I guess, but it was a brilliant occasion. For me being out here, it's kind of a different experience as well because I obviously would love to get back and get there again at some stage. I’ll see how it goes in the next couple of years.”

For now, however, McDonagh (who was last part of the Galway panel in 2021) will be cheering on the Tribeswomen from the other side of the world as they aim to bridge a 20-year gap to their sole TG4 All-Ireland Senior Football Championship triumph to date.

It will be a tough task against a Kerry team that are competing in their third successive Brendan Martin Cup decider, but McDonagh expects Galway to be in a buoyant mood following their knockout victories over Dublin and Cork en route to tomorrow’s game.

“Hopefully their confidence is high going into the final now because they can’t say that they haven’t deserved it. They’ve really put back-to-back performances and I feel like they’re peaking at the right time. I hope those girls just take it as an opportunity to just have a crack at it. There’s no better time really,” McDonagh added.

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