Eamonn Murray swept tears away from his eyes at the final whistle. Champions again.
“Ah you’ll have to have some of that,” the Meath manager said of the high emotion before letting his mind drift. “Losing players and stuff, we’re probably good enough to win three or four in a row, but we won’t.”
It was a sombre thought amid the carnival, that beating Kerry to retain the Brendan Martin Cup in front of 46,440 could be the high point of Meath’s incredible journey.
In a few days, Vikki Wall and Orlagh Lally will head away for AFLW duty. Emma Troy, who enjoyed another excellent final showing, will be unavailable too, according to Murray while the management team is expected to, if not break up, change considerably.
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They took everyone by surprise last year with their maiden triumph. This year, they’ve probably taken themselves by surprise mostly with the holes they’ve found themselves in at times, only to continuously navigate their way out.
They conceded 1-2 early on this time before finally getting going though, for the most part, Meath delivered a strong display, arguably their best of the season.
It was as if they timed the whole thing?
“To perfection, yeah,” agreed Murray. “We knew that so we weren’t that worried during the week. Kerry probably thought during the week that they know all about our system and how we play. Dublin thought the same last year but when you hit this system, you know all about it. Kerry haven’t been held to 1-7 for a long, long time. And we got the goals, that’s our highest score in a long, long time too.”
Still, for a team that is at heart counterattacking, chasing a game and playing catch up is never part of the strategy.
“You’d never be worried with this bunch and I mean that, not for a second,” maintained Murray. “The response to how we started was brilliant, three different players scoring goals. Bridgetta Lynch came off the bench and she was magic, played the best game of her life. Orla Byrne came on and did well, all our subs did very well. We were told during the week we didn’t have subs but I think we proved today that we have.”
There isn’t a whole pile that this Meath team lacks right now but if Wall, Lally and Troy aren’t available in 2023, and if the management changes, things could look a lot different.
Beyond the two All-Irelands they’ve won, their legacy will be the inspiration they’ve given to other counties. It wasn’t by coincidence that Donegal, Kerry and Mayo all ended up in the last four of this year’s Championship, Dublin and Cork already out.
“I think we showed Kerry and a few other teams that it can be done,” argued Murray. “They are just a very special bunch. And it takes a very special bunch to go two in a row.”
If there was pressure on Meath to perform and to live up to their favourites billing, it didn’t appear to weigh heavily on them.
“Personally, I thought there was less of a hype around us this year,” said midfielder Maire O’Shaughnessy. “Personally I certainly didn’t feel more hype or pressure on us or anything like that. It was just a different challenge. Last year, we were heading in against Dublin, we’d never played them and maybe we were massive underdogs. This year we were heading in as slight favourites. And we were familiar-ish with Kerry. We hadn’t played them in over a year but we were keeping a close eye on them. Look, they were completely different years. We kept our preparations the same and it worked out for us.”
O’Shaughnessy is the partner of Meath footballer Shane McEntee. He is serving with the Defence Forces in Mali and enjoyed a FaceTime chat with the two-time All-Ireland medal winner after full-time.
“I think he was able to watch the game over in Mali, we’ve gone worldwide,” she smiled.
Overplayed
O’Shaughnessy felt the narrative that Meath were struggling with all year, or at least not quite themselves, was overplayed.
“We haven’t been allowed to play our game, that’s because we’re not playing it, it’s because teams aren’t letting us,” she maintained. “The standard of ladies’ football is rising and rising. It’s more a testament to other teams than a fault of ours.”
In her victory speech, Shauna Ennis talked of Kerry having enough about them to get back to this stage next year. That remains to be seen.
“Our aim is definitely to get back here again next year,” insisted joint Kingdom manager Darragh Long. “I think we’ve proven a lot of you [media] folks wrong over the last 12 months. We’ve been written off countless times in every game this year and this group has constantly stood up.
“The 36 girls out there have put in a huge shift since the first of November last year. Myself and Declan Quill are just immensely proud of what they’ve done. I think we’ve put Kerry ladies’ football back on the map. We’ll take this one on the chin.”
There was TG4 All-Ireland intermediate success for Laois who held off a dramatic late Wexford rally to win by 1-13 to 1-11 though the junior decider will require a replay in just under a fortnight following Antrim’s 1-13 to 1-13 draw with Fermanagh.
