LAST UPDATE | 13 Apr 2022
RETIRED DUBLIN PLAYER Noelle Healy says the comments made about AFLW stars Sinéad Goldrick and Lauren Magee were ‘bizarre’ and ‘unfair’.
Meath Ladies manager Eamonn Murray was speaking to the media last week following reports that star forward Vikki Wall is linking up with the Australian sport, when he made a negative remark about AFLW and Melbourne duo Goldrick and Magee, both former team-mates of Healy.
“It’s [AFLW] not good, far from it, and I think if any of you check, the players coming back, the Sinead Goldricks or the Lauren Magees or any of them, they don’t exactly set the world on fire when they come back over here.”
Healy, who stepped away from Dublin last year, says she is bewildered by Murray’s remarks and says it was unfair to isolate the Dublin pair.
“Completely. I don’t understand why he felt the need to single out those two players at all. You look at Sinead Goldrick, she went in the summer of 2019 and 2020, came back in 2020 and the comment that these players aren’t going to win championships for you, Sinead Goldrick got player of the match in an All-Ireland final and was nominated for player of the year for the second year in a row.
“The next year she was unfortunately hampered by injuries. She had a horrendous hamstring injury and from the base that she had in Australia and coming back with us as well managed to come back and get to an All-Ireland final. So I don’t really understand where that (comment) was coming from at all.
“You look at the same with Lauren Magee: she had her debut season over the winter of 2020 and came back and was phenomenal for Dublin last year so I think it was unfair to single those two players out, especially when you don’t really understand the circumstances around what’s happened in the season when they were coming back.”
Healy added that Dublin manager Mick Bohan has shown an exemplary attitude towards his players travelling abroad to play AFLW and suspects that Murray’s comments may have been prompted by his own frustration towards losing a top talent from his team.
“Yeah, look, I think Mick’s (Bohan) attitude has always been brilliant. Whatever your opinions are of the sport, we’re amateur players, a lot of them are young women who have come out of college and have this fantastic opportunity to go over so while it’s disappointing for our sport it’s not something that I was ever interested in.
“I think the LGFA missed a trick initially; I think they probably over-celebrated Cora (Staunton) going over a little bit to the detriment of themselves but that’s their own business. I don’t know if it was Eamonn Murray’s own frustrations boiling over at how it may affect his own panel but I don’t see why he felt the need to single out two of Dublin’s best players. It was bizarre.”
Healy also paid tribute to five-time All-Ireland winner Niamh McEvoy who announced her inter-county retirement this week after an incredible 14-year career.
“I was delighted that she actually announced it,” she notes about the 2019 All-Star.
“I think she had all the intentions of slipping away quietly, the epitome of the player she is. But it’s great to see the outpouring of support and acclamation that she has been getting.
“For us, she was one of the most underappreciated and under-recognised players that there was. She only won one All-Star. You can think back to 2015 when she was putting in phenomenal performances in All-Ireland finals so it’s great that she is getting the recognition we privately as a team would have appreciated.
“She is a very close friend of mine. We would have come up U14 together. We experienced everything together, shared rooms and things like that particularly in the All-Ireland final in 2010. I thought she might go again because you see Sinead Ahern and Lyndsey [Davey] sticking on but personally it was the right decision for her to make.”
Get set for the summer by listening to The42 GAA Weekly’s Football Championship preview pod here, and get 50% off an annual membership when you sign up this week using the code CHAMPIONSHIP2022 at members.the42.ie
Highlights from The42 Membership / SoundCloud
