Scullion: Antrim ladies aiming to push on in Division Three

By Shaun Casey

FOLLOWING an impressive opening round win, Antrim are aiming to make it two from two when they head to Limerick this weekend, but joint-manager Chris Scullion knows his side won’t have it all their own way.

Limerick just avoided the drop last season, finishing in sixth place in the Division Three table, while Antrim gained promotion in 2025, winning all eight of their contests to collect the league title.

The Treaty County will have home advantage on Sunday afternoon, meaning a difficult trip awaits the Antrim ladies. “Limerick have new management and a new-look team, so they’ll be eager to make a statement,” said Scullion, who manages the team with Michael Devlin.

“We will have to work extremely hard again. Going away from home is always a challenge, and travelling on the day isn’t ideal, but it’s something we’re used to dealing with. We’ll prepare the same way and focus on ourselves.”

While Antrim came away with a 12-point win over Clare on the opening day, Scullion insists they still have plenty to work on for the remainder of the season, although he did admit that posting a final tally of 3-15 was impressive.

“We are always happy with a win – we weren’t happy with the first half, but the girls rectified it and we were particularly happy how we finished the game,” Scullion added.

“Clare were always going to be a tough opening test after coming down from Division Two, and they showed that in the first half.

“We actually felt we were getting into good positions but just weren’t clinical enough, which kept Clare in front at the break. The main thing for us was staying calm and believing that if we kept working, the scores would come.

“It was a really positive (scoring) return. We had nine different scorers which is very pleasing, but we said that we needed to be more clinical, and we wanted to see it in the second half.

“The impact from the bench was huge and it gave us a lift in terms of pace and energy. Once we got a run of scores, our confidence grew and we were able to play with more freedom. That second-half performance was much closer to what we want to see from this group.”

The overall target for Antrim in Division Three is to build on the progress of last year and they hope to “build momentum” before the championship.

“The league is about building.

“We’ve brought a lot of new players into the panel (11 in total), and some girls are still catching up after injuries and there’s our Moneyglass girls with the extremely successful, but long season they had.

“It’s about getting everyone up to speed and developing consistency in how we play. It’s a competitive league and there won’t be any easy games, but if we can build momentum and learn from those tough tests, it hopefully puts us in a good place heading into championship.”