The evolution of Ladies Gaelic football

I was 12 years old when I played against Cora Staunton for the first – and mercifully – last time.

It was a game between Breaffy and Ballintubber and to be eligible, you had to still be in national school.

It was the spring of 1994. Cora was corner-forward for Ballintubber and I was in goal for Breaffy. I can still remember vividly Barry Cosgrove, our corner-back, coming up to me in a panic when he saw a girl coming into his corner.

“McGreal, what will I do?” I didn’t have any answers. Barry was a tough, no-holds-barred defender but the usual rules of engagement involved him marking a boy. He wondered how he should apply himself against a girl.

I said to him to see how it went.

The first ball that came into their corner, Barry was out in front but next thing got a big dunt in the back from Cora, who gladly took possession and fired it over the bar. Barry watched it sail over whilst prone on the ground.

The rules of engagement had been set by Cora. They went at it hammer and tongs, each one giving as good as they got. Cora struck over a few worldies, Barry defended with all his might and we all left the pitch marvelling not at the impish centre-half forward by the name of Alan Dillon but the prodigious girl in the corner.

In Breaffy we were served with a further reminder of the talent of girls football in the county later that summer when Tourmakeady beat us in the West Mayo Under 12 final.

They had a couple of exceptional boys on the team who would shine for the club for years in Michael James Meenaghan and Brian Naughton but the three players everyone was talking about after were Martha O’Malley, Lorraine O’Neill and Aoife O’Malley, who practically beat us on their own.

It was a time when there were not near enough opportunities for girls in sport as there are now. In Achill, Marie Gallagher would be good enough to play senior soccer for Ireland on 16 occasions from 1991 to 1995 but she had no outlet for games growing up apart from the local Corn Acla U14 GAA tournament.

Meanwhile, her brothers got to excel in soccer and Gaelic football with Achill teams. It was Marie’s misfortune to grow up a decade before remarkable and welcome change emerged.

Cora Staunton and Martha O’Malley were part of a pioneering group of Mayo ladies footballers who won the county’s first senior All-Ireland in 1999, only five years after they had flagged their talents to us.

Mayo won four All-Irelands in five years and the game was revolutionised in the county. Ladies clubs started to crop up throughout Mayo and while there is still much work to be done, huge progress has been made since the 1990s.

The Achill Under 10 LGFA team I am involved with were fortunate enough to be asked to be one of four clubs who played at half-time in the recent All-Ireland Senior LGFA clash between Mayo and Cork in MacHale Park.

To mark the 50th anniversary of the LGFA, girls from every club were also invited to take part in a colours parade before the game.

It was a great idea by Mayo LGFA under the stewardship of their current chairperson, Sinéad Stagg, also a member of All-Ireland winning teams with Cora Staunton, Martha O’Malley and Co.

For girls growing up in 2025, there are so many more opportunities to play sport than was the case when Cora Staunton’s generation were kids. Our daughter Frankie started with the Achill U6 girls when she was just four!

It was great to see so many clubs so well represented in MacHale Park that day but what was also so apparent was that if it wasn’t for those girls and their parents who accompanied them, there would have been virtually no crowd at the game at all.

Granted, the Mayo senior ladies have had a tough few years but, aside from their All-Ireland winning years, their support has been quite modest. We’re all part of the problem. Frankie has been at countless men’s games with me and her brother Éamon but that was her first Mayo ladies game. The greater crowds at men’s games means a greater atmosphere, which in turn leads to a better experience for the kids.

But part of the experience of being a young supporter is dreaming of someday being out on the pitch playing for that team. Frankie adores Aidan O’Shea and Ryan O’Donoghue but can’t aspire to be them.

However, it was great for her and her friends to watch Sinéad Walsh, Aoife Geraghty and Danielle Caldwell and dare to dream.

We’ll be back but it is a struggle for the ladies game to get greater support.

Societal attitudes need to change too.

It is pathetic to see the amount of keyboard heroes dismissing England winning the Women’s Euros recently, so triggered by the fact that the women’s game might get decent exposure. A fair proportion of these ignoramuses have daughters, but they never let that stand in the way of their misogyny.

They froth at the mouth at the suggestion that women footballers should receive the same remuneration as their male counterparts. Whatever about the nuances of such a debate, deciding to defend vastly overpaid men is quite the reveal about oneself. I’ve seen a few in Mayo declare their obnoxious nature in this regard for the world to see. This should never be allowed to become normalised.

Thankfully, in Ireland, there is very little evidence of such vitriol towards Ladies Gaelic. If anything, it might be a bit too far on the other extreme, where people tiptoe around levels of criticism (not abuse) that would be quite normal in the men’s game.

Overall, the ladies game is hindered by the fact it is playing a massive game of catch-up compared to the men’s game which has established such a strong tradition and presence.

The LGFA is making steps in the right direction and it is going to be fascinating to see how effective the integration of the LGFA (and the Camogie Association) with the GAA (planned for 2027) may or may not be.

Mayo are making really good strides at underage in recent years, and I think we will see the fruits of that in the senior team in years to come. And hopefully, plenty more people in the county can get behind them.