It has been a great year for Gaelic games, Limerick hurlers showing us just how skillful and resilient they are and Mayo easing 75 years of pain by bringing the Sam Maguire Cup to Castlebar and various other towns in the county for the first time since 1951.
Us old timers long for a return to September for the finals, but judging by how popular the GAA is right now, if the All-Ireland finals were played on New Year’s Day or Good Friday, Croke Park would be full.
The inter-county season will end with the three All-Ireland Camogie finals in Croke Park on Sunday next and then it’s on to the club scene. It hasn’t been a great year for Cork with only their male minor footballers securing an All-Ireland win so far, but on Sunday the Rebelettes have a chance of more silverware in a competition that they have dominated for almost a century. Cork won their first All-Ireland Camogie title in 1934 when they beat Louth and two years ago they won the famous O’Duffy Cup for the 30th time when beating Galway by a goal. Last year Galway won their 5th senior final when beat Cork by a point. Yes, Sunday’s finalists plus Kilkenny have dominated Camogie senior finals in recent years. In the past the Cork teams included several dual players, but that era seems to be over. They still have the experienced five times All-Star winner Ashling Thompson at midfield, though.
Last year Camogie had an embarrassing issue regarding the choice of equipment worn by the women, skorts or shorts, and it took an EGM to get it sorted. This year it has been plain sailing for the women’s game and two weeks back the semi-finals double header in Thurles where Cork beat Tipperary and Galway overcame Kilkenny was watched by a record attendance of 10,311 supporters.
Attendances at All-Ireland finals in recent years are around the 30k mark and it looks like the three finals, which are shown live by RTE, are very popular with television viewers as last year 353,000 viewers tuned into the national station’s coverage.
It’s going to be close and maybe the Cork women will bring back another All-Ireland title to Leeside.
Armagh and Cavan will meet in the Junior final at 12 noon and it will be followed by the Intermediate final between Antrim and Laois at 2pm. Then the big one at 4.15pm.
Sadly during the year we lost former Camogie player and later Camogie president Liz Howard. I’m sure Liz will be remembered on Sunday.
