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TG4 All-Ireland Ladies Football Championship round-up
By John Fallon
Goals from Niamh Hetherton and Caoimhe O’Connor in a strong second half showing powered reigning TG4 All-Ireland champions Dublin to a 2-13 to 0-5 win over Donegal, having led by 0-6 to 0-4 at the break having played against the breeze.
“Our girls knew that they’d have to go at it from the start and in fairness they did,” said Dublin joint manager Paul Casey. “They worked very hard. To go in two points up at half-time was a big boost and some of the scores they did take in the first half were very, very good.”
Eva Gallagher scored four points for Donegal who will now face Mayo next weekend to decide which other team advances from Group 3 to the knockout stages.
“We’ll have to dust ourselves off and play Mayo next week,” said Donegal manager James Daly. “It’s us and Mayo the next day. We’ve both lost to Dublin, Mayo were a lot closer.”
Cork manager Joe Carroll praised his side for keeping their composure to stage a remarkable comeback and pip Waterford by 1-15 to 1-14 and stay in the hunt for the TG4 All-Ireland senior championship.
Cork, the reigning Lidl Division One league champions, looked set to bow out of the race for the Brendan Martin Cup when they trailed Waterford by five points with seven minutes remaining, having lost their opening game at home to Armagh.
Waterford, who now head to Armagh next weekend with all three teams in Group 1 still in contention, led by 1-8 to 0-4 at the break thanks to a goal from Karen McGrath but got caught at the death with Katie Quirke scoring a late penalty before then hitting the winner with five seconds remaining.
“We didn’t go mad at half-time because we were doing a lot of things right, but we gave away the ball a lot and we had nine wides,” said Carroll.
“We stressed the importance of not giving the ball away and I think as the match wore on our fitness started to kick in, as was shown in the league as well. We were running big time in the last ten or 15 minutes.
“Look, maybe we were a bit lucky to get the winning score at the finish. It could have gone either way but these days no match is ever won until the last kick, and we kept fighting and fighting.”
Danielle O’Leary scored 1-3 as Kerry booked home advantage in the last eight as they saw off Kildare by 1-19 to 0-8 in Newbridge, having built up a 1-9 to 0-3 lead in the opening half.
“Look, we got a home quarter-final and that was the main job for today,” said Kerry manager Mark Bourke. “It's a team effort really at this stage. We must work on a few block-downs and a few turnovers, but I suppose you get them in every game.”
Aoife Rattigan and Molly Aspell scored seven points between them for a Kildare side who face Tipperary next weekend to see who advances to the quarterfinals.
Galway also made it two wins in a row as Olivia Divilly hit 2-6 and Róisín Leonard got 1-6 as they ousted Tyrone by 4-20 to 2-7 in Tuam. Galway, whose other goal came from Leanne Coen, led by 1-8 to 2-2 at the break.
Niamh O’Neill and Sorcha Gormally scored all but two points of Tyrone’s tally. They face Meath next weekend with the winners advancing to the quarterfinals.
“We’re delighted to get the win,” said Galway manager Daniel Moynihan. “It was hard to know what we were coming up against with Tyrone, having not played them in recent years. So, it was a case of getting our homework done and going out to show what we were capable of doing.’’
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