GALWAY STAR NIAMH Mallon has sent her support towards her former camogie team-mate Ciara Mageean, in the wake of the Irish athlete’s cancer diagnosis.

The two-time Olympian and European 1500m champion announced on Friday that she has been diagnosed with cancer and is undergoing treatment.

Writing on Instagram last week, the 33-year-old said the diagnosis has “been a lot to take in,” but is “ready to face this with the same fight I’ve always brought to the track”.

And Galway forward Mallon, originally from Mageean’s hometown of Portaferry in county Down, is thinking of the “super athlete” and “even better person”. 

“I know Ciara quite well,” said Mallon. “We played underage camogie for Portaferry for a number of years before Ciara’s athletics career took off.

“Ciara’s a super athlete, but I think the thing that everybody in the country can relate to, she’s an even better person.

“It’s a tough time for Ciara, it’s a tough time for her family and I know that everybody, particularly in Portaferry, is behind and wanting to wish her well. If there was ever a woman to fight what Ciara has to face, she’s the woman to do so.

“I’ve absolutely no doubt that just like every setback that Ciara’s had in her career, she’ll overcome this one just as well. Ciara’s a great person and a complete and utter role model for everybody, not only in Portaferry but across the country.”

Mageean has strong camogie roots. After winning 1500m gold at the European Championships last June, she famously told RTÉ’s David Gillick: “I didn’t grow up playing camogie to get boxed in.”

Niamh Mallon was speaking yesterday after winning the PwC GPA Women’s Player of the Month in camogie for June.

Mallon, who moved to Galway for work in 2018 and transferred to the Tribe after a lengthy inter-county career with Down, has starred on their run to the All-Ireland semi-final, where they face Tipperary on Saturday 26 July in a UPMC Nowlan Park double-header. Defending champions Cork face Waterford in the other last four clash.