Amy Boyle hoping for family feeling in county final day

By Niall Gartland

BEST out of five? Loughgiel midfielder Amy Boyle hopes that they come out on top of their most important match of the season against Dunloy to date, that being Sunday’s Antrim Senior Championship final clash.

The Shamrocks have dominated the Saffrons camogie scene for the last decade – and the word ‘dominated’ is putting it mildly.

Loughgiel are seeking their 11th consecutive county title this weekend. They’re a generational team but they won’t be taking their neighbours Dunloy for granted either.

They’ve met four times this year already – they’ve lost two and won two but it’s worth noting that Loughgiel ran out comfortable victories when they met in the group stages of this year’s championship and will go in as warm favourites to defend their title.

It’s also a repeat of the 2022 final, which Loughgiel won by 0-9 to 0-6 with weather conditions playing a big part in a low-scoring contest.

Amy Boyle, one of the very best midfielders in the province, commented: “If you look at the results, it’s hard to know what’s going on. We drew with Cushendall at the start then we didn’t have much to spare against Ballycastle. After that we got a really good result against Dunloy.

“We’ve played them four times between the League, Feis and championship. There’s rarely that much between us, we narrowly beat them in the final two years ago. I don’t remember that day over in Glenravel too fondly, it must’ve been the wettest conditions we’ve ever played in. It was so low-scoring that day, everyone got soaked.”

Amy has formed an effective midfield partnership with Lucia McNaughton down the years though new manager Ronan McCloskey, a former hurler of considerable renown with the club, decided to mix things up a bit and it’s been working well.

“There’s a bit of a change up this year, Lucia and I seem to have been split up! So Anna Connolly is alongside me in the middle now, she’s the same age as myself so we’ve been playing right up through. It’s been a bit different as I’m used to playing in the middle with Lucia, but Anna is also a great partner. I don’t think I’ve ever seen her get tired, she’s been up and down the field like I don’t know what.”

Boyle has been part of this richly successful journey almost since its inception. She’s won eight championships in eight years and she’s privileged to line outside players who have been there since their winning streak commenced back in 2014.

“My first year on the panel was in 2016 and at that stage they were already going for the three in-a-row.

“I came straight in from u-16 as a lot of us did, and right away you were taken aback by the level the older girls trained at. They were at a completely different level and it didn’t surprise me that they’d been so dominant because everything they did both on-and-off the pitch was so admirable.”