Gavin Cooney

LEONA MAGUIRE’S MEANING of Christmas: a chance to unwind at home in Cavan and spend more than a couple of nights in a row in her own bed. It also offers her a chance to reflect on 2024, which she politely describes to The 42 as an “up and down year”.

The high point came in July, when Maguire became the first Irish winner on the Ladies’ European Tour by taking the Aramco Team Series by a shot at the Centurion Club in London.

With Alisson Lee making a charge, Maguire found herself in the second cut, marginally off the 18th fairway. The lie was okay but the distance was perfect, so caddie Dermot Byrne told Maguire it was time to hit the shot of the year. Maguire then hit a customarily perfect hybrid to leave her within birdie range. She sealed the deal to win by a shot. 

WHAT. A. SHOT.

World class from @leona_maguire 🌟#RaiseOurGame | #SEETheImpact pic.twitter.com/eHkZM7eHsE

— Ladies European Tour (@LETgolf) July 5, 2024

Maguire will always be a groundbreaker in Irish golf, having become the first Irish winner on the LPGA Tour in 2022. 

“They are the things I’ll look back on with a lot of fondness in 20 years when I am retired,” says Maguire. “It’s nice to show the girls coming up through the ranks that if I can do it, they can do it too.”

Just a fortnight after the win in London, however, Maguire announced she had split with her caddie, with whom she had been working since 2021 and shared her LPGA victories. She demurs when asked about the reasons behind the decision. 

“To people familiar with the situation, it wasn’t a surprise,” she says. “I am not going into the ins and outs of the details, but Dermot and I had a fantastic relationship for two-and-a-half years: we achieved a lot together, achieved a lot of milestones.

“There were certain things that made it not possible to continue working together. We went our separate ways, we are still on very good terms and I wish him all the best. That’s all I’m going to say on it.” 

Kerry native Verners Tess has been carrying Maguire’s bag since, and the pair will continue to work together in 2025. “Whether I make a birdie or a bogey,” says Maguire of her new caddie, “he is still very positive and keeps me going. I tend to be very harsh and critical on myself. Sometimes I need that.” 

Nobody, however was more harsh on Maguire this year than Europe’s Solheim Captain, Suzann Pettersen. Matchplay brings out the best of Maguire’s competitive steel, and her Solheim Cup record prior to this year’s joust in Virginia was stunning: she had never sat out a single session across her two previous appearances, and her record read seven wins, one tie, and two defeats. (Those two defeats were by the slimmest margins, as Maguire took them both to the 18th hole.)

Pettersen returned as captain this year having led Europe to a dramatic comeback victory in Spain last year, but this time she benched Maguire for Friday morning’s foursomes and all of Saturday’s action. With a point to prove, Maguire won her Sunday singles match against Ally Ewing to give Europe brief hope of another comeback victory before the USA closed out, 15.5 to 12.5. 

Speaking to reporters immediately after the event, Maguire said her bit-part role was a “bitter pill to swallow”, saying Pettersen didn’t give her an explanation as to why she sat out three of the five sessions. Maguire then posted on X, Form is temporary, class is permanent. 

“People find it hard to believe but we are on very good terms,” says Maguire when I ask if she has spoken with Pettersen since. “She is still someone I respect and admire a lot. That’s anything with a captain: if you win people think you’re a genius and if you don’t, people have other things to say. She did it her way and that’s all you can ask from a captain.” 

Maguire says Pettersen has still not provided a selection explanation, however. Maguire says statistics played a role in the decision, which were apparently a different data set than those used by American captain Stacy Lewis, which were provided by KPMG. 

“There were new stats apparently brought in for the week,” says Maguire. “I know Stacy Lewis relied heavily on KPMG stats, for the past two sessions our stats were different, they weren’t KPMG stats.

“We never saw the stats, we never had any input to the stats, so I’m not quite sure what the stats were or what they said. But apparently they said I wasn’t the best for whatever matches it was. That was Suzann and the backroom team’s decision.” 

In the days leading up to the Solheim Cup, Maguire was urged by Grenfell United – a survivors and bereaved support group for those affected by the Grenfell tower fire of 2017, in which 72 people died and more than 70 people were injured – to end her sponsorship deal with Kingspan, following the publication of the final report of the public inquiry into the disaster.

 The 1,700-page report said Kingspan “embarked on a dishonest scheme to mislead its customers and the wider market”.

The tower block was covered in combustible products because of the “systematic dishonesty” of firms who made and sold the cladding and insulation, inquiry chairman Martin Moore-Bick said. He called out “deliberate and sustained” manipulation of fire-safety testing, misrepresentation of test data and misleading of the market.

Cladding firm Arconic and insulation firms Kingspan and Celotex faced particularly heavy criticism.

Arconic was found to have “deliberately concealed from the market the true extent of the danger” of using its cladding product, particularly on high-rise buildings.

Kingspan had, from 2005 and even after the inquiry began in the wake of the fire, “knowingly created a false market in insulation” for use on buildings over 18 metres, the report said.

In a statement following the report, Kingspan said it “extends our deepest sympathies to those impacted by the tragedy”.

Kingspan said the report “explains clearly and unambiguously that the type of insulation was immaterial”.

The company has long said its K15 insulation product made up 5% of the insulation in the tower block and was used as a substitute product without its knowledge.

Grenfell United called on sportspeople to end their sponsorship deals with Kingspan, and Shane Lowry announced in September that he was ending his association with the company. Grenfell United initially wrote to Maguire’s management company in September 2023 to end the deal, but say they received no response.

Committee member Ed Daffarn, a survivor of the fire, repeated those calls ahead of the Solheim Cup, saying if Maguire did not end her Kingspan deal, she was making “a conscious decision to endorse a company that the public inquiry found behaved with ‘persistent dishonesty’.”

Maguire is wearing a Kingspan logo along with those of her other sponsors on her shirt as she talks to The 42. 

“Kingspan have been a big supporter of me for the last five years,” says Maguire when I ask why she has decided to maintain her association with Kingspan. 

“I have strong ties to Cavan and they are a big Cavan company and they have been very supportive of me and my career, and loyalty is something that is important to me.

“I can’t speak for Shane [Lowry] and his decisions, he is obviously in a very different position at his stage in his career and on the men’s tour. I obviously sympathise with all the victims of Grenfell and their families, but ultimately I am a golfer first and foremost and Kingspan have been supportive of me and I have made the decision to stand by them.” 

Maguire also says she is unaware of being sent a letter by Grenfell United when it is raised by The 42, at which point we clarify the letter was sent to her management company. 

“I suppose it was a very busy year and a very busy summer,” she replies, “but my management company deals with all of that behind the scenes and let’s me play my golf.” 

Returning to matters on the course, Maguire says her targets for 2025 are pretty obvious: to perform better at the Irish Open and in the majors. Maguire missed the cut in three of the five majors this year, with her best finish a T24 at the PGA Championship. Key to improvement, she says, is her driver, but she is not chasing more length.

“Accuracy is more important than length,” she says. “I was talking to Shane Lowry about it a few days ago, he was asking why is everyone [in the women's game] not getting longer and longer? For them, they hit it as far as they can, find it, and hit it again.

“Strokes Gained: Off the Tee for them is all about distance. In the women’s game we don’t have the strength to get it out of the rough to spin it, especially in the majors when the greens are so firm. So accuracy is still of a premium on the LPGA Tour.” 

Leona Maguire was speaking to mark the launch of KPMG’s research celebrating an inspiring year for women’s sport in Ireland. The study underscores the significant societal impact of female athletes, with a remarkable 92% agreeing that female sports stars have a positive impact on Irish society.