RACHEL Whelton doesn’t suffer from middle-child syndrome. She doesn’t bow to the theory that the middle child feels left out. Instead, she stands out.
Her older and younger brothers, David and Andrew, might both play senior football with Castlehaven, but Rachel is the Haven hero who kicked the score that sent the club’s ladies’ team up into the senior ranks for the first time ever. She has also won FIVE county titles in SIX seasons with the Haven.
Beat that, David and Andrew!
West Cork sport is dotted with stories of middle children excelling. There’s Ballineen Bullet and Olympian Phil Healy. Olympic rowing champion Fintan McCarthy is another (his twin Jake is a few minutes older). Rachel’s club-mate Brian Hurley, now the longest serving player on the Cork football panel, is a middle child, too. Add Rachel to that list.
Her match-winning free in the county intermediate football final will become the stuff of local legend: the kick that fired Castlehaven ladies football to senior level. That was a tense day at MTU, as Haven’s clash against Glanmire went all the way to a 25-metre free shoot-out after extra-time. They couldn’t be separated. Even in the shoot-out, they were deadlocked, 1-1. Then Rachel stepped up. The 23-year-old was the calmest person in the middle of the storm.
‘I had our last kick – I’m not sure if that was more pressure or not – but the girl who was coming after me for Glanmire had been in great form so I was under pressure in that sense. If I missed and she scored, then we lost,’ explains joint-captain Rachel, who shares the workload with Siobhan Courtney.
‘I’m not a person who gets nervous in those situations. I’m calm. Ultimately it was my self belief that put the ball over the bar. I knew I could do it.
‘I soloed the ball twice, hopped it once, and after that you hope it goes over. Thankfully it did.’
Award winner Rachel Whelton pictured with her family; from left, Elma Whelton, Ann Whelton, Andrew Whelton, Pauline Whelton, Hannah Murnane and Jennifer O’Connell.
When Glanmire missed their next kick, Rachel’s score turned out to be the winner. ‘It makes it sweeter to win it like that (in a shoot-out). It wasn’t given to us, we had to work hard to earn it, and that makes it all the more fulfilling,’ she says.
For the second season in a row, after an equally unforgettable county junior A triumph against Dohenys in 2021, Castlehaven were crowned champions after a shoot-out.
It’s the latest success in this team’s remarkable rise. In 2017 they won the county junior D football final, and that lit the fire. Castlehaven have now won four county championships in a row – junior C (2019), junior B (2020), junior A (2021) and intermediate (2022).
Rachel is one of the Haven originals, part of this rise through the ranks from the start. She is also one of the Castlehaven players who had to leave the parish to play football before the ladies club was set up in 2013. She lined out with Clann na nGael before then returning home when Castlehaven formed its ladies club.
‘The ultimate aim was to play with my home club,’ Rachel says, and the success of the current Haven adult ladies team will leave a lasting legacy. Young girls in the blue and white can see a path to senior football. They have local heroes to look up to. Like Rachel admired Haven legend Nollaig Cleary, who played for Gabriel Rangers as her home club didn’t have a ladies’ section, now young girls will look up to Rachel, and Siobhan Courtney, and Mairead O’Driscoll, and Alice O’Driscoll, and Aideen Santry, and Shelly Daly and Co.
‘My younger cousin is U10 and they won the Eilish Collins Cup this year, and for those girls to have role models in the club now is great because they can see what is possible,’ she says. ‘Success breeds success, and our underage girls can see what we have achieved, and the hope now is that they can progress up through the ranks to the senior team.’
Rachel Whelton kicks the winning free for Castlehaven in their dramatic Cork LGFA intermediate final win against Glanmire. (Photo: David Ribeiro)
Rachel’s influence and heroics have an impact outside the parish, too. She’s a fifth-class teacher at St Patrick’s Boys National School in Skibbereen.
‘They are my number one supporters. One of them said to me, “we’re not supporting Castlehaven, we’re supporting you!” – and that’s very fair!’ Haven’s county final-winning hero smiles. ‘Their loyalties lie with their clubs, but they were supporting me. It’s great for them to have a female role model, too. When they think of sports they might associate it with a male sportsperson, so to have a female sportsperson to look up to is welcome.’
Rachel isn’t finished yet. Castlehaven wants to make an impact at senior level. That will take time. They’re now slugging it out with established superpowers like Mourneabbey, but Castlehaven aren’t content to just make up the numbers at senior level either.
‘We know it will be a big step up for us, but our goal is to compete at senior level,’ Rachel says. The competition in the Whelton household has just gone up a few notches – who will win a county senior title first? Rachel? Or David and Andrew? This middle child is certainly standing out.
- Rachel Whelton and Siobhan Courtney, joint captains of the Castlehaven team that won the 2022 Cork intermediate football final, were presented with Celtic Ross West Cork Sports Star monthly awards in recognition of their achievement.
