Galligan delighted as Knockbride ladies bridge the generations

By Niall Gartland

KNOCKBRIDE clinched the Ulster Ladies Intermediate title in style with a superb victory over Brigid O’Neills last weekend, and the message Ciaran Galligan is keen to press home to his charges is why stop now?

The Cavan side enjoyed what he describes as a “lovely homecoming” following their second-ever provincial title win, but returned to training on Tuesday night with an All-Ireland semi-final clash against Naomh Abán (Cork) pencilled in for the last weekend of November. And what’s more – Knockbride have been afforded home advantage.

Galligan said: “I know it sounds a bit cliched but we really weren’t thinking about anything else other than Sunday.

“I got speaking to the club secretary after the game and said ‘so where are we going now’, thinking we’d be in Offaly or Laois or some place like that.

“She said we have a home game and I nearly fell off my seat.

“We definitely don’t want the story to end – we want to get to the All-Ireland final. The girls had a lovely homecoming, there was a Garda escort and basically the whole community was there to welcome us home. There was a lovely fireworks display but we’re back training tonight (Tuesday), we’ll get the cobwebs shaken off and really knuckled down for the semi-final.”

Making Sunday’s win ever more special was the family ties linking this current set-up with the Ulster Senior Championship winning team back in 2003.

“There’s a strong generational connection. The picture of the 2003 team is on the wall of the dressing room, and there’s four girls on our team whose mothers played on the team of 22 years ago. The girls are aware of their history so that makes it extra special.”

Knockbride laid the platform for victory in the first half, surging into a 3-8 to 1-4 lead at the interval and they never really looked back.

“It’s fair to say we got a dream start. We got out of the blocks quickly, worked a very nice team goal, and then got a tap in for the second.

“We then got a penalty, scored by our captain, and that gave us a really good platform.

“We couldn’t have planned for a better start and we knew the job was half-done at the break. Everything just seemed to go according to plan so it was just a very special day for the entire community and there was wonderful support in Brewster Park for both teams.”