WINNING WEEKEND HAS AN ORANGE GLOW
Richard Bullick
Ballyhegan’s Grace Ferguson got the ball rolling, Crossmaglen’s Lauren McConville was unveiled as the ceremonial line-up’s magnificent No 7 and Dromintee’s Aoife McCoy completed a glorious Armagh hat-trick of All Stars at Saturday’s Dublin banquet.
A fantastically successful season, which brought the Orchard outfit’s first ever National League title and also saw them reclaim the provincial championship crown from Donegal had seen Armagh receive a record eight All Star nominations.
However, having had hopes dashed before, Armagh followers were wary of expecting the losing semi-finalists to get more than one recipient at the weekend, with All Ireland Players’ Player of the Year nominee McConville seen as the best bet.
McConville picked up Player of the Match as Armagh triumphed over Kerry at Croke Park in the first NFL Division One final in Orchard history, won both All Ireland Player of the Month awards for April and was crowned Ulster Ladies Footballer of the Year earlier this autumn.
As it transpired, Lauren’s fourth consecutive shortlisting did indeed lead to the first All Star of her exceptional career on a night when the Armagh vice-captain along with Kerry full back Kayleigh Cronin lost out to Galway’s Nicola Ward for All Ireland Player of the Year.
But by the time McConville was announced at left wing back there was already orange on the board thanks to the irrepressible Ferguson having got the nod at right corner back in a line-up featuring seven players from All Ireland champions Kerry.
The icing on the cake came when another popular Orchard hero McCoy was unveiled at centre half forward, matching the tally of three All Stars when Armagh reached their only All Ireland final to date back in 2006.
There were no formal All Stars awarded following the pandemic-delayed 2020 All Ireland campaign, when Armagh last reached the semis, but Clodagh McCambridge and both Mackin sisters, Aimee and Blaithin, made that year’s Team of the Senior Championship.
McCambridge and Blaithin Mackin along with one of those 2006 All Stars, Caroline O’Hanlon, were also shortlisted this time along with the latter’s Carrickcruppen clubmate, goalkeeper Anna Carr, and Clann Eireann wing back Cait Towe.
All Ireland runners-up Galway got four All Stars, while there was one for Armagh’s fellow losing semi-finalists Cork so Dublin drew a blank at the Bonnington Hotel as did the 2021 and 2022 All Ireland champions Meath.
With Lauren McConville still in Australia after the end of her AFLW campaign with Gold Coast Suns, her national All Star – like her recent Ulster Ladies Footballer of the Year award – was collected by her proud mum Michelle.
The 29-year-old becomes the first Crossmaglen player to win a ladies football All Star since the then Orchard captain Bronagh O’Donnell in 2006 and emulates her cousin Rian O’Neill, who was one of six Armagh men to receive an All Star earlier in the month.
McCambridge and Towe resisted the lure of the red carpet in favour of an early night ahead of Clann Eireann’s Ulster Senior Club Championship showpiece in Omagh’s Healy Park on Sunday afternoon and their sacrifice was well rewarded.
As she had done in this season’s inter-county Ulster final in her other orange jersey, and indeed in this autumn’s Orchard domestic decider, Clann Eireann captain Niamh Henderson produced a Player of the Match performance.
A year ago in Omagh, Henderson became the first female footballer to captain an Orchard club team to an Ulster title triumph and Clann Eireann have retained their provincial crown courtesy of a convincing 2-17 to 2-8 victory over aptly-named Cavan champions Lurgan.
