Dublin turn up the heat on Meath and emerge as deserving champions

Irish Times

2 days ago

All-Ireland women's senior football final: Dublin 2-16 Meath 0-10
It ended with a pitch invasion that had to be called back, the Dublin subs and selectors rewound to the sideline like the flex on a vacuum cleaner. As Carla Rowe stood over a free at the Hill 16 end, she alone among the Dublin contingent seemed to know that the hooter wouldn't go until she kicked it dead. It was about their only misstep of the day.
Dublin racked up their seventh All-Ireland here with a display of intensity and hard-nosed belligerence that burned Meath to a crisp. They attacked the final from the get-go and got their business done early, putting the game out of reach well before half-time. When Niamh Hetherton buried their second goal on 22 minutes, they were 2-8 to 0-2 ahead and Meath were goosed.
All around the pitch, Dublin players hit their own personal bullseye. Rowe was a menace in attack, insistent and clinical all day. Wing-forward Orlagh Nolan ran a marathon of ball through the Meath rearguard, Sinéad Goldrick was an iron presence around the middle third. Leah Caffrey held Emma Duggan to three shots from play in the whole game.
'We knew when we met them this morning that they were ready for it,' said Dublin co-manager Paul Casey. 'They'd pep in their step and they probably came in here bouncing. But it's nothing like the way they're going to leave here because it's absolutely fantastic. You're hoping that all your big names and stars will turn up and give a performance. I think that they went over and beyond that.'
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For Meath, the winter's regrets will be rooted in the fact that they came to the biggest game of the year and left so few footprints in the sand. All the vim and ruthlessness of their semi-final display against Kerry deserted them here. They didn't land their first score from play until five minutes into the second half, by which stage they were 10 points behind.
Nothing Meath tried worked out. Vikki Wall had a golden chance of a goal after three minutes but hurried her shot, presuming she had an advantage after being pulled back by Caffrey. Not only did she not get her free, she wasn't set properly for the shot and pulled it well wide. It was that kind of day for Wall, who seemed to get on the wrong side of referee Gus Chapman and cut a frustrated figure all afternoon.
A goal then might have settled Meath. As it was, they could never get that close to the whites of Abby Shiels's eyes again, with Dublin repeatedly fouling them any time they came into the scoring zone. Meath finished the day with 10 frees inside the men's 40-metre arc – Dublin weren't above a healthy dollop of naked cynicism when it suited them and Chapman never looked minded to produce a yellow card to warn them off it.
Dublin's Niamh Hetherton scores a goal against Meath in the first half. Photograph: Leah Scholes/Inpho
And so Meath went the whole of the first half without scoring a point from play. Not all of that was down to the threshing machine of the Dublin defence. The Meath attack was nothing like as slick or organised as Dublin's, with too many players frequently drawn towards the ball and acres of space left in front of goal.
By contrast, Dublin's attack was layered and sophisticated, with Rowe and Hannah Tyrrell constantly pulling into space in the inside forward line before laying off to runners coming through. Rowe was particularly elusive in that devastating opening quarter, putting the first goal on a plate for Nicole Owens, drawing a foul for a Tyrrell free and slaloming through for a score of her own.
Dublin led by 1-4 to 0-1 after 10 minutes, by which time the only thing that seemed to be in reliable working order for Meath was Robyn Murray's kickout. Time and again, she was able to get the ball away and beat the Dublin press, only for the Meath attack to malfunction up ahead of her. Duggan dropped a couple short, one from play and one from a free, while the busy Ciara Smyth shanked one wide.
All those misses meant that Meath had no disaster insurance. Murray's kickouts were magnificent right up until they weren't. She barely missed one for the first 18 minutes and then she coughed up two in 90 seconds. For the first, Rowe put Kate Sullivan away and Murray had to pull off a diving save.
Meath players Aoibhín Cleary and Vikki Wall after their side's defeat in the TG4 All-Ireland Ladies SFC final. Photograph: Seb Daly/Sportsfile
She didn't get away with it a second time though. This time it was midfielder Éilish O'Dowd who snapped onto possession and fed Niamh Hetherton. All it took from there was a quick sidestep and she gave Murray no chance. It meant that with only 22 minutes gone, Dublin were 2-8 to 0-2 ahead and all six of their starting forwards scored from play. Can't ask for much more in an All-Ireland final.
After that, the rest of the game was like an election night count when the tallies have already told everyone who's going to fill the seats. Meath scored the last two points of the half and the first three after the restart to bring the gap back to eight points in the 36th minute. But Dublin knuckled down and rattled off the next three on a row, with Rowe, Tyrrell and the impish Sullivan pushing them out of sight again.
They saw it out like champions. Ruthless, relentless, imperious. The class of 2025.
Dublin:
Abby Shiels; Jess Tobin, Leah Caffrey, Niamh Donlon; Sinéad Goldrick, Martha Byrne, Niamh Crowley (0-1); Éilish O'Dowd, Hannah McGinnis; Nicole Owens (1-0), Niamh Hetherton (1-1), Orlagh Nolan (0-1); Carla Rowe (0-4, 0-2 frees), Hannah Tyrrell (0-5, 0-3 frees), Kate Sullivan (0-4).
Subs:
Sophie McIntyre for Owens, 49 mins; Aoife Kane for McGinnis, 51 mins; Hannah Leahy for Donlon, 54 mins; Laura Grendon for Tyrrell, 55 mins; Chloe Darby for Sullivan, 56 mins.
Meath:
Robyn Murray; Áine Sheridan, Mary Kate Lynch, Shauna Ennis; Aoibhín Cleary (0-1), Sarah Wall, Karla Kealy; Orlaigh Sheehy, Marion Farrelly; Megan Thynne, Niamh Gollogly, Ciara Smyth (0-1); Emma Duggan (0-7, 0-5 frees), Vikki Wall (0-1), Kerrie Cole.
Subs:
Katie Bermingham for Farrelly, 25 mins; Farrelly for Ennis, 42 mins; Ella Moyles for Sheehy, 42 mins; Niamh McEntee for Cole, 49 mins; Ciara Lawlor for Kealy, 51 mins.
Referee:
Gus Chapman (Sligo).