Ladies Day Can Teach Us All A Lesson

Croke Park had it all yesterday. Marriage proposals, last minute penalties, cards, tears of joy and despair. Once again the captain receiving the Cup on the Hogan Steps was wearing the Dublin jersey. What a week in sport for the County. Full credit to the six teams involved for the superb entertainment, passion and skill they brought to a warm and sunny Croke Park.

The success of the Ladies All Ireland Final raises the question, is Ireland one of the leading countries for women’s sport? And it also has some lessons for other codes.

The attendance at yesterday’s ladies finals was 42,286, making it the highest attendance for any single women’s sports event this year. There are lessons in the way that the LGFA promote their games. The championship is tiered and with every team starting out with the opportunity to get to Croke Park on finals day.

Six different teams have contested the Intermediate final over the last three years and five the junior final. This churn suggests the game is in a healthy state of competitiveness and so called ‘lesser’ counties are getting a chance to play in a Final at Croke Park, every player’s dream. 

At senior level although Dublin won and Cork have dominated affairs in recent years, the competition has thirteen counties participating. Ladies football is in good health and growing. Mick Bohan the Dublin winning manager pointed out last week that a practice approach to skills development and coaching can only serve to bring the game on even further. Providing young girls and young women with the opportunities to play are essential. And there is much to commend what is being done so far.

Through the summer the Ladies Game is featured regularly on live television, it offers a glimpse into the strength of the game in counties that don’t make it to the Finals. It also has its act together in terms of social media with Jerome Quinn’s video’s doing a massive job in promoting the game. One of the goals of the year across all codes was scored by Armagh’s Aimee Mackin in a quarter final, becoming a social media sensation in the process.

The Ladies Game has had its act together for a number of years now but this year with LIDL getting behind the game there has been a new impetus with superb TV advertising promoting the Championships.

The tiered approach works and the crowds present at Croke yesterday are testament to an extremely family friendly ethos. The Ladies game goes out of its way to attract a young audience and while the air horns and cheering mightn’t be everyone’s cup of tea (especially grumpy commentators on Twitter!) it brings a different type of crowd noise and colour to headquarters. The marketing is working and the game is benefitting.

Similar sorts of crowds for other big GAA days when a stadium isn’t at full capacity would be welcome. However the Ladies game manages it, it works well.

The rules of the Ladies game work well, in particular the sin bin is an adequate and punitive sanction. Mayo suffered when they went down to fourteen and then thirteen players in quick succession.

Congratulations to Dublin on winning the Final at the fourth time of asking. They had the smarts at the right time and once they got their noses ahead the scoring prowess of Sinéad Aherne and two goals from super sub Sarah McCaffrey and another by Carla Rowe sealed the deal. A big shout out to the players of Fermanagh and Derry who served us up a cracker. Fermanagh were probably shellshocked by the Oak Leaf performance, having been clear favourites. Fair dues to Sharon Murphy for her coolly despatch penalty with 48 seconds left. She was fortunate that Megan Devine’s pile driver had come back off the bar. They live to fight another day - 8th October. Shout out also to the Ladies from Tipperary, who defeated Tyrone by 3 points, 1-13 -1-10.

All in all lessons to be learned, praise where it’s due and thanks to the teams for an enthralling entertaining and family friendly day.