Dublin's Niamh Crowley is one in a million

Dublin's Niamh Crowley is one in a million

Article by John Harrington (published on www.gaa.ie)

Dublin LGFA star, Niamh Crowley, is a confident and eloquent speaker.

This is all the more impressive when she tells you that for a good chunk of her childhood, she largely lost the ability to communicate with any real articulacy.

At the age of eight she was diagnosed with Landau-Kleffner Syndrome, a rare childhood epilepsy that affects just one in a million people.

Symptoms include seizures and the loss of receptive and expressive language skills among other cognitive problems.

“I would have experienced seizures, specifically nocturnal seizures, so in my sleep more often than not,” says Crowley.

“I was kind of lucky in that aspect because I was still able to play football the whole way through and never interfered with my football.

“But yeah, it would have affected my expressive and receptive language. So all the language I had learned up until the age of eight, all my vocabulary and speech, had kind of deteriorated and kind of disappeared over a while.

“I spent lots of time doing speech therapy in and out of Temple Street and an endless amount of hours at the kitchen table with my dad, going over vocab and trying to learn all that language again.

“It would have been really frustrating because in my head I knew what I wanted to say, but I just had no vocabulary and I had to learn how to speak again.

“It was really embarrassing because you're in school and you're nine, ten and you're stuttering and you can't explain yourself and people are kind of looking at you and stuff.

“Thankfully I'm now 12 years seizure-free.

“I'd say the key to that was the early diagnosis and the fact that my speech therapist had come across one of these cases when she was working in England.”

Because of her own life experience, Crowley is now a passionate ambassador for the ‘I am Number 17’ campaign which raises awareness of the fact that one in 17 people in Ireland are affected by a rare disease.

“Yeah, I'm delighted that myself and James McCarthy are ambassadors for the campaign,” she says.

“If you're in a coffee shop and there are 17 people there, one of those people will have a rare disease at some point in their life.

“The idea behind it is to bring as much awareness as possible so we can build a community of people who have rare diseases, spread more knowledge, and assist those people who have rare diseases because it can range from emotional needs to physical needs.

“The more knowledgeable we become about them, the more we can help these people.”

Though she’s still only 21, Crowley is now very much an established member of the Dublin team with two All-Ireland medals in three years.

By her own admission though it’s only now that she feels like she’s comfortably treading water after being thrown in at the deep end as an 18-year-old in 2023.

“Yeah, when I first joined the squad in 2023, I'd say the whole entire year I experienced imposter syndrome. Every training session I was like, 'God, what am I doing here?' I thought I didn't really have a clue what I was doing.

“It was very daunting, the first training session, seeing people you idolised growing up. Because the likes of Carla (Rowe) and Leah (Caffrey), they would have played for Dublin for 10 years up until that point and you spend your whole childhood and teenage years watching them.

“So, then to be a teammate of them, it is kind of a strange situation. But I couldn't vouch more for the girls in the way that they kind of took us all under our wings.

“Leah was like a big sister to me and I can say that for so many of the players. I'd say especially the defenders, we kind of have a defensive sisterhood. So that was really lovely. I think ultimately that's why we were so successful that year.

“We put as much effort into the friendships and the bonds as much as we did with the football. And I think that's really core. And I think that's what I've learned anyways from being involved is that the bonds and the friendships and what you do for those people is just as important as the footballing skills.

“You could have the best squad of 30, 35 players. But if you're not willing to do the dirty work for your team, then it's useless.

“I had a bit more of a peaceful year this year with myself. Because I think I would have been extremely harsh on myself in the first year.

“Even if I kicked a solo a metre above my head, I would be really disappointed with myself. And I think to an extent I actually probably ruined the experience for myself in the first two years, because I took the joy out of it because I was just being far too harsh on myself.

“And I think that's probably one of the most important things I learned from being involved, is that at the end of the day it's a game of football. We're all able, we're all playing on behalf of our county on a squad of 30, 35, so you belong there.

“I suppose at the end of the day it's a huge commitment but it's also a hobby. So you need to kind of learn how to separate that from everyday life. And I kind of learned that last year. So yeah, big learning curve.”

What Crowley describes as a “rollercoaster” 2025 ended with the ultimate high of an All-Ireland title as Dublin eventually came good in spectacular style.

The 2026 season starts with a first-round Lidl National Football League clash against Kerry on Saturday at Phairc Jysk home of Round Tower GAA club (Clondalkin) and Crowley is buzzing about the prospect of playing under many of the same new rules that make the men’s game such a more entertaining spectacle last year.

“We're all really excited,” she says. “I think individually and then as a collective, we're all really looking forward to this year. I know last year was quite successful, as in we achieved our end goal, which was winning the Brendan Martin Cup. But we have to draw a line under that at some point and move on.

“It's a new year, new squad, new rules. We're really looking forward to the new rules. I think they'll really improve the ladies game. I think we'll see a faster game. We'll see more of the players' skills. It'll be more physical.

“So we're definitely looking forward to that aspect.

“And then also new faces. A lot of girls are going to make their county debuts. They'll be able to put on the Dublin jersey. So it's a really exciting time for them.”