Cork captain Lauren Homan drawing on experiences of legendary former team-mates
“It’s great to have that experience and have learned from those big, big players. I’m just going to try to bring that into the game on Saturday and hopefully it just gets over the line.”
During her time as part of the successful All-Ireland senior winning squads of 2017 and 2018, current Cork intermediate captain Lauren Homan rubbed shoulders with some of camogie’s biggest stars.
When she was introduced in the 52nd minute of Cork’s O’Duffy Cup final victory over Kilkenny on September 10, 2017, Homan was surrounded by legendary figures such as Aoife Murray, Rena Buckley, Eimear O’Sullivan and Gemma O’Connor.
It was a similar case when she was sprung off the bench for another narrow showpiece win against the Cats 12 months later as she was joined amongst the Cork forwards by notable names like Amy O’Connor, Orla Cotter and Katrina Mackey.
Now that she is one of the more experienced faces in a Cork intermediate side that has a youthful look to it, Homan finds herself drawing on the countless lessons she absorbed from the above-mentioned players.
“Big, big names within that squad. Just to look up to those girls and even learn from those girls from previous years, I definitely have. Probably put me down to ground a few times as well!” Homan acknowledged.
“It’s great to have that experience and have learned from those big, big players.
“I’m just going to try to bring that into the game on Saturday and hopefully it just gets us over the line. Hopefully I can just drive the girls on as much as possible.”
The game on Saturday Homan alludes to is an All-Ireland intermediate camogie championship semi-final encounter with Offaly at Semple Stadium in Thurles (throw-in 6pm).
Following an impressive success in a National Camogie League Division 2B final back in March, Cork comfortably advanced to the last-four of the intermediate championship with five successive wins in Group 1 of the competition.
This included a 0-15 to 1-11 home triumph over Offaly back on June 8, but while there is some confidence to be garnered from that game, Homan is also wary of a potential backlash from the Faithful County.
“We’re not going to take too much from the win against Offaly. It was a really close game, we only beat them by a point. We know there’s not going to be much between the two of us,” Homan added.
“It’s good to have the one up on them, but they’ll be coming back for revenge. We’ll still have to be up to the standard of playing and hopefully get the win.”