Latest news with #EllenMolloy
Irish Times
14-05-2025
- Sport
- Irish Times
Ellen Molloy learning to love football again and targeting Ireland return
Soon after Ellen Molloy took the plunge and left Wexford Youths for Sheffield United in the English Championship last September, she had one of her regular chats with her grandmother, Breda Roche. 'She was asking me how it was going and I just let on. I said, 'oh, it's great, we had training today, it was grand'. And Grandma says, 'I can tell you're not enjoying it'.' She knew you too well? 'She did,' she laughs. 'She just said, 'you don't have to please other people, you don't do this for anyone but yourself. When you were at Wexford, you were always smiling'.' READ MORE Over in England? Not so much. It had nothing to do with the club. 'I couldn't say a bad word about them, they were so good to me,' says Molloy. It was because when she was mulling over their offer of a professional contract that she learned her grandmother had stage four lung cancer. It was crushing news for the 20-year-old. 'We were very close. Calling her my Grandma doesn't really do it justice, she was a lot more than just that to me. She was my number one supporter, usually the first person I'd call after a game. She didn't care if I was playing for a Sunday League team or for Ireland. All she wanted was for me to enjoy it, she just wanted me to be happy. She'd be watching my games at home on her iPad, although when she saw me do my ACL she said she'd never watch again. But she did.' Ellen Molloy was capped at just 16 by former Republic boss Vera Pauw. 'I'm ambitious, I want to play for Ireland again, but I want to be happy too.' Photograph: Laszlo Geczo/Inpho It was in September 2022 that Molloy suffered that anterior cruciate ligament injury, one that kept her out of the game for a year just at a point when she was flourishing and living up to her billing as the league's brightest young talent. Vera Pauw recognised that ability two years earlier when she made the Kilkenny native one of Ireland's youngest ever senior internationals, at just 16. The injury, then, was a devastating blow. 'It felt like the worst thing that could have happened to me. All I'd ever done was play football, so when that was taken away it was like I didn't even know who I was.' 'So when I came back from the injury, it felt like I had to make up for lost time. I had always hoped to play in England one day, so when the chance came with Sheffield United, I felt like I had to take it – because you never know if you'll get one again. 'But maybe I rushed going over, maybe I wasn't fully ready. My head wasn't right after the news about Grandma, I just felt I couldn't leave her.' She agonised over the decision, but eventually, encouraged by those around her to seize the opportunity, she set off for Sheffield. 'The management, the players, they were brilliant with me, but because of Grandma, my heart just wasn't in it. It got to a stage where I just didn't even enjoy the game. I'd be just waiting for training to be over so I could go home. Most days we were done by 2.0, so I'd sit in my bed for the rest of the day and do nothing. And that's not me, I've always been someone who likes to keep busy.' That chat with her grandmother was the last 'real conversation' they had. Come October, she got the call from home, she needed to be back in the next day or two. 'And about a week later, Grandma passed away.' 'I remember everyone saying to me at the time that she would want me to go back to Sheffield, but deep down I knew she wouldn't. She knew me better. She knew I wasn't happy. But I did go back. A week later, I scored against Birmingham and I remember not feeling one bit of happiness. There was none of the usual joy when you score. That's how bad my head was. I'd lost my love for the game. There was just nothing.' Ellon Molloy scores against Birmingham as former Ireland team-mate Birmingham's Louise Quinn (right) looks on. 'I remember not feeling one bit of happiness. There was none of the usual joy when you score.' Photograph:'I knew what I needed to do for myself, and that was to go home. To be with family, be with friends, step back, and see if I could remember why I started playing football. See if I could find that love again. And the only place I felt I could do it was Wexford, my second home.' She knew how it would look, quitting after four months. 'But if I'd stayed, I'd have fallen out of love with the sport completely. I'm ambitious, I want to play for Ireland again, but I want to be happy too. Grandma taught me how important that was.' 'And I think the challenges of playing the game professionally aren't spoken about enough, it goes from being fun to being your job and that can be hard. So much free time to fill too, when you've been used to a life of combining studies, work and football.' She's back to that life now, working towards becoming a PE and geography teacher, doing the occasional four-hour return trip from Kilkenny to a Dublin school where she's brushing up on her training. 'I'm trying to find the sweet spot in it all, but I wouldn't rule out going back to England, or wherever, in the future. For now, though, I just want to get back to being that child who played the game simply because she loved it. And at Wexford, I'm finding that love again.' She won the last of her seven caps for Ireland last year, after Eileen Gleeson recalled her to the squad after a two-year absence, and if she maintains her form for Wexford – eight goals in her last six games – she might well catch Carla Ward's eye soon enough. 'But I've a lot do before I'm even in the conversation,' she says. 'I'd love to play for Ireland again, but most of all, I just want to get back to loving playing football.'
RTÉ News
23-04-2025
- Sport
- RTÉ News
Rachel Graham: Ireland recall on cards if Ellen Molloy keeps up form
Rachel Graham is hopeful that Ellen Molloy will be back wearing a Republic of Ireland jersey again before long after offering a reminder of her gifts as a player on Saturday. The 20-year-old was instrumental for Wexford in their 3-2 victory at Shamrock Rovers in the SSE Airtricity Women's Premier Division, cancelling out Áine O'Gorman's opener with a superb long-range strike and then earning and converting the penalty that proved enough to seal all three points. The brace brought Molloy up to three goals for the season, having returned to Wexford ahead of the 2025 campaign after a brief spell in England with Sheffield United. The next aim will be trying to break back into Carla Ward's Ireland squad. Molloy had been included in a development squad in February and earned the most recent of her caps last October towards the end of Eileen Gleeson's tenure after a two-year absence, which was prompted by a serious knee injury. Now that Molloy is working her way back to form, Shelbourne and former Ireland midfielder Graham told the RTÉ Soccer Podcast that the Kilkenny-born midfielder has few peers when she is at her best. "There's no question Ellen is one of the best players in the league, definitely, and one of the best players, for me, that we've produced as a country," Graham said on the back of a Saturday when she herself was involved as second-placed Shelbourne thrashed Cork City at Tolka Park - the second game in a row that Shels have plundered seven goals. Listen to the RTÉ Soccer podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. "She's a really naturally talented player, she's so hard to defend against and that's from experience trying to mark her. "She can run with the ball but she keeps the ball so close to her body. It's very hard to nick it off her and if you do step off her, she can shoot and score from distance. "She's really, really hard to defend against. But I think she was back to her best on Saturday. It's definitely the best I've seen her in a long time. "She's had a few struggles. She suffered an ACL injury and last year she went to Sheffield and look, it probably wasn't the right time for her or the right move - it's not to say she'll never go (abroad) again or it never will be right for her - but I think she just wanted to be back at home playing where she's really enjoying her football and that's starting to shine through now. "I know she missed a lot of Wexford's pre-season, so it probably took her the extra couple of weeks to maybe get back to her best, but she caused Rovers an awful lot of trouble. "And then she goes and wins her team a peno and scores the peno then. What a goal😮 Ellen Molloy equalises for Wexford with a magnificent strike. — LOI Women (@LoiWomen) April 19, 2025 "She's probably someone that Carla is very aware of, or has been made aware of, and I think if she keeps performing like she is, if she keeps herself fit, she's definitely in with a chance of being one of those League of Ireland players that is getting a call-up." Molloy's technical qualities could potentially give Ireland another creative midfield in the mold of Denise O'Sullivan. "I definitely think she has the talent, there's no question about that," said Graham. "These are the players we want to see playing for Ireland, are really naturally talented players that we produce here. "Maybe it was a fitness issue, she'd been out injured and I don't know how much game-time she was getting with Sheffield, so probably a few things going against her but I think definitely this year, if she's performing how she did against Rovers, she's so hard to defend against. "For our own Ireland team, sometimes that position is hard to play where it's someone who's creative in that midfield area, who can either get goals or set up goals. "I think she's definitely someone we need to kind of almost protect to make sure we can get her to play at senior international level because these players are so hard to come by. You can't really coach the talent that she has so we need to make sure to make the most of her."
Irish Independent
22-04-2025
- Sport
- Irish Independent
Ellen Molloy at her brilliant best as Wexford women overcome Shamrock Rovers in Tallaght
Shamrock Rovers 2 Wexford FC Women 3 Wexford People Today at 13:30 WEXFORD'S UPTURN in form produced another strong result as they took all three points away from Tallaght Stadium in the SSE Airtricity Women's Premier Division on Saturday. The Ferrycarrig Park side fell a goal behind against the run of play in the first-half but turned the game on its head, with Ellen Molloy scoring twice and Charlotte Cromack also on target to propel Seán Byrne's side to success.
