Westmeath Ladies Senior Football Championship: Mullingar Shamrocks 1-7 St Mary’s, Rochfortbridge 2-6

Mullingar Shamrocks Ladies Gaelic footballer made their 2017 championship debut in the bitter cold of Springfield on Thursday night and were unfortunate to end on the wrong side of a 2-6 to 1-7 scoreline. St Mary’s, with wind advantage, made the early impression on the scoreboard and established a 1-3 to 0-1 (Clara Thornton) lead after 15 minutes.  Shamrocks fought back superbly and points from Clara (0-2), Faye Walsh and birthday-girl Niamh Kennedy reduced the deficit to the minimum. A second Rochfortbridge goal from Nicola Judge extended the St Mary’s lead. A great save by Liveta prevented a third.  Michelle Buckley with a fine point for Shamrocks had the final score of the half (2-3 to 0-6).

Shamrocks dominated the early play of the second half but failed to reflect this control on the scoreboard. Great St Mary’s defending foiled several Shamrocks attacks and the failure to register a score during this period of dominance was crucial to the overall result. Shamrocks too defended superbly with Carole Finch and Melek Fagan leading by example. As a result, sores were hard to come by but St Mary’s landed two points before Shamrocks registered their first score, a goal that followed a move involving several players with Honor McNamara applying the finishing touches. Clara Thornton followed with a pointed free but unfortunately this proved to be the last score of the day.

Mullingar Shamrocks were unfortunate to lose out on this occasion as this was their finest performance in a number of seasons in what was a superb game of football and was a reflection of the hard work and training over several weeks under the guidance of team manager Ciarán McKenna and his assistant Spike Fagan.  The tackling and work rate of the players was particularly noteworthy in what was a great team performance.

Mullingar Shamrocks: Liveta Lazeuskaite; Rachael Hannigan, Carole Finch, Melek Fagan: Áine Melody, Niamh Spellman, Tara Fagan; Michele Buckley and Anna Jones; Faye Walsh (0-1), Gemma Kerrigan, Niamh Kennedy (0-1) [Karen Hegarty]; Clara Thornton (0-4), Lisa Burke (Kristy Dunne), Honor McNamara (1-0)