PEIL CLUB FOCUS
SURPASSING EXPECTATIONS
GLANMIRE’S ELLEN TWOMEY SPEAKS ABOUT THE SQUAD’S JOURNEY FROM COUNTY TO ALL-IRELAND FINAL. BY DAIRE WALSH
By Daire Walsh
It wasn’t the first national success she has enjoyed with the team, but the currentaccount.ie All-Ireland Intermediate Club Championship final victory in December at Croke Park is an occasion that Glanmire defender Ellen Twomey will remember for some time to come.
Back on December 9, 2018 at Duggan Park in Ballinasloe, an 18-year-old Twomey featured prominently as the Cork side defeated Tourlestrane of Sligo in a currentaccount.ie All-Ireland Junior Championship decider on a scoreline of 1-22 to 3-11. Fast forward a little over five years and she was occupying the pivotal position of centre half-back in Glanmire’s emphatic 5-8 to 1-6 success against another Connacht outfit in that aforementioned intermediate showpiece – Leitrim champions Ballinamore Sean O’Heslins provided the opposition in this instance.
Additionally, having been an up and coming prospect when they claimed county, provincial and All-Ireland crowns in 2018, Twomey was tasked with leading the team as captain over the course of an unforgettable club season in 2023. This meant that she had the honour of lifting the intermediate trophy on behalf of her club at GAA HQ and this proved to be a great privilege from her own point of view.
“The girls that I’m representing are the best bunch of girls you could imagine. Last year with training, obviously everyone has put in a shift when we’re out on the pitch for an hour and a half or whatever it may be three times a week,” Twomey acknowledged.
“Last year as well, everyone was kind of doing their own bits outside of training. Whether it was extra road running, in gym, getting their nutrition work right, whatever it may be. Everyone was pulling their weight that bit extra as well last year.
“Everyone had really bought into it last year. We pulled out all the stops, we sacrificed so much. For me to be representing the girls and going up and collecting the cup, any one of them could have been up there, so it was an absolute privilege to do it.”
While Glanmire had achieved that clean sweep of titles in the junior ranks of club football, their main focus was initially just on finishing at the summit of the Cork intermediate championship. Yet after their county final triumph over Naomh Aban was followed up by a Munster showpiece victory at the expense of Limerick’s Monagea, Twomey and her team-mates started to dream big.
“It kind of came as a bit of a surprise to us [going all the way to an All-Ireland final and winning it] because at the start we would have been just planning for the county final. After defeats for the last three years in-a-row, all we wanted was the county final this year.
“Obviously then, when we got as far as the Munster series and the All-Ireland series, we knew that we had a really good chance if we got our heads straight. It was probably a nice surprise in that sense, that we didn’t really look at it as one of our goals at the start of the year, but we ended up winning it then in the end.”
Whereas a powerful first half paved the way for Glanmire to ease themselves to victory against Ballinamore, Glanmire were regularly put to the pin of their collar en route to All-Ireland final day. After having a single point to spare over Naomh Aban in the Cork decider (0-11 to 1-7), Glanmire once again dug deep to earn a 0-8 to 1-3 win in their provincial showdown with Monagea.
They had the same margin of success (2-5 to 0-9) in their All-Ireland quarter-final triumph away to London’s Tir Chonaill Gaels at McGovern Park, Ruislip on November 25 and they subsequently came from behind to overcome Meath’s Na Fianna by four points (1-7 to 0-6) in a last-four clash at Mallow eight days later.
“I keep going back to the county final, but I do think playing that really tough game in Cork really did stand to us. As did the last couple of county finals. We went behind in the game, we were reduced to 14 in the county final and I don’t know was it an attitude that we just refused to lose this year or was it just the experience from the last couple of years stood to us,” Twomey remarked.
“We kept our heads, we knew to stick to the game plan. We really just pressed on their kick-outs and we just stuck to our game plan, and the forwards popped over a couple of points for us. Which were the difference in the end. I think then after that, we knew that was our toughest game all year and we went behind in it.
“In fairness, from 1 to 20 in any given game that we have, it has been our never-say-die attitude. We keep going to the final whistle. There was certain games, even Na Fianna in the All-Ireland semi-final, we didn’t score from play in the first half I don’t think.
“We didn’t panic, we had a bit of talking to at half-time and went out and drove on. We all just kept our heads. In fairness, the experience is really after standing to us with the long season.”
It would have been something to store in the memory bank in any event, but what made Glanmire’s remarkable run of 2023 all the sweeter for Twomey was the fact that her cousins Niamh and Aishling McAllen were also part of the club’s journey to the promised land. Niamh was selected at centre-forward and chipped in with one of the five goals that Glanmire registered against Ballinamore, while Aishling was introduced off the bench as a 47th minute substitute.
In fact, as Ellen explains, the Twomey and McAllen families have been ubiquitous presences around the Glanmire club for quite some time – making it is very appropriate that three of them had such a big part to play in last December’s All-Ireland win.
“Those cousins are like sisters to me as well. We’re very, very close, the McAllens. We’ve Niamh and Aishling, who’d be playing. They’d be on the panel and then Olivia is on the sideline. She did her cruciate last year. She’s back playing, but she’s camogie and football. If she went back playing the two, she’d only be asking for trouble!” Twomey added.
“I think it is really, really special to be involved with cousins. Our uncle, the McAllens’ Dad, is the chairperson of the club. Their Mom is involved in the committee and my Mom is involved in the committee. Everyone is involved family wise and even then we’ve cousins, because my Dad [who sadly passed away in 2016] has a huge family.
“They play with different clubs around the county and they’re all asking about how the matches are going. We have a small bit of a GAA mad family, which is a good thing. The fact that then a couple of us are involved in the same club makes it all the nicer then when we’re winning big games like this as well.”