Kinsale junior camogie team ready to write their own history

BY KIERAN McCARTHY

LATE last year, the history of Kinsale GAA Club was captured in a fantastic new book, Heroes Past and Present – A History of Gaelic Games in Kinsale, 1886 – 2016.

The ink is barely dry in that page-turner and already new chapters are being written, this time by the club’s first-ever ladies junior camogie team.

Last Wednesday night on home turf, the very first Kinsale junior camogie team took to the field in their first competitive outing, a junior C league game against Cobh.

It was a moment of history for Kinsale GAA and while the result didn’t go their way, it was the first step into adult camogie for the club.

This is the third season for Kinsale Camogie Club and now it caters from U6 up to junior level, as Noel O’Sullivan explains.

‘The camogie club started three years ago with U12s, and before this adult team, the girls who were U12 and U14 had no team to aim for, no team above them so the decision was made to start an adult team. 

‘The response has been fantastic,’ O’Sullivan said.

A meeting was held before Christmas to gauge the interest in a junior ladies camogie team and with an enthusiastic turnout, it was given the green light, with O’Sullivan, Eithne Fitzpatrick and Brian Murphy all involved.

‘The atmosphere for our first game against Cobh was amazing,’ O’Sullivan said.

‘The goal we set at the start of the year was that we lose no player and that everyone enjoys it and has fun.

‘There are a few girls involved who never played with Kinsale GAA Club before and they are loving it now. There’s no pressure on anyone.’

Last year Kinsale’s junior ladies footballers won Cork and Munster titles and reached an All-Ireland final as they put the club on the map, and there is a crossover between the two teams with a number of the footballers now also playing camogie.

The squad involved against Cobh included Christina Broderick, Eadoin O’Leary, Trish Ryan, Niamh Steinson, Rachel Kiely, Aoife O’Leary, Emma McAuliffe, Aoife Keating, Cara O’Dwyer, Emma O’Brien, Aisling Lee, Hester McCarthy, Selina O’Donovan, Jacqui Lynch, Niamh Heffernan, Jacinta O’Callaghan, Dervla Kelly, Sinead Keating, Caoimhe O’Callaghan and Ann Marie Queva.