CROKE PARK DREAMS: Carla Rowe Leads Dublin With Pride and Purpose
By Daire Walsh
It won’t be the first time for her side to grace the venue for a provincial decider, but Carla Rowe is thrilled that Dublin are back in Croke Park for today’s TG4 Leinster LGFA Senior Championship final against Meath.
Back on May 28, 2022, a Hannah Tyrrell goal from a penalty proved crucial in guiding the Jackies towards a 1-7 to 1-5 provincial showpiece victory at the expense of Meath in GAA HQ. While Rowe didn’t feature in that game, she registered an impressive haul of 1-3 when she captained Dublin to another Leinster final win over the Royal County in Croke Park on May 12 of last year.
Both of the above games were part of double headers with provincial men’s football finals in north Dublin and while Laois Hire O’Moore Park in Portlaoise hosted a similar affair between the same two teams in 2023, today’s Leinster LGFA spectacle will share the same billing as the much-discussed clash of Louth and Meath for the Delaney Cup.
“I think it’s a great idea, I think it’s good. The more games we can get in those big venues and make a big deal of it, and get crowds behind us, it’s fantastic. It’s great for us on the pitch. It’s great for our families, who obviously give up so much supporting us,” Rowe said.
“It’s also really good for those supporters who come out all the time. Young girls and young boys who are seeing the sport and hopefully it will be a really good spectacle.”
After serving as co-captain of the team with Niamh Collins in 2022, Rowe was made standalone skipper of Dublin a year later. Having watched on when her team-mate Sinead Aherne climbed the steps of the Hogan Stand in Croke Park to collect the Brendan Martin Cup for four years in succession from 2017 to 2020, it was the Clann Mhuire ace’s turn to lift the All-Ireland crown when the Jackies defeated Kerry on August 13, 2023.
On a day when the aforementioned Tyrrell kicked eight points in a superb first-half display, Rowe helped herself to an impressive tally of 0-4 in the second period as Dublin claimed a 0-18 to 1-10 win at the expense of the Kingdom. Unsurprisingly, captaining her county to victory in this game remained the proudest moment of her football career thus far.
“It always brings a smile to my face. Always something that you want to chase after. Being able to give that feeling to young girls is something that drives us older girls and certainly drives me on.
“I want any of the young girls who are in our squad, who work so hard and put effort in, to be able to just feel that feeling. Because that’s what pushes you in the darker days of losses or winter, or hard training. Definitely the goal for this year, but we’ll take it step by step. We won’t get too far ahead of ourselves.”
Whereas Mick Bohan was at the helm for the five TG4 All-Ireland SFC titles that she has won as a Dublin player, 2025 finds Rowe playing under the joint-management team of Paul Casey and Derek Murray.
The star attacker was already familiar with this duo, given Casey first joined Bohan’s backroom set-up as a selector in 2018 before Murray was also added to the mix four years later.
While the fact that the county’s new managers were heavily involved with the squad before this year is a help, Rowe’s time on the inter-county scene pre-dated Bohan’s eight-season stint with the Jackies.
The school teacher at Balbriggan Community College was handed her Dublin senior debut by Greg McGonigle in 2014 and featured under the Derry native in three consecutive All-Ireland finals at Croke Park. All three of these games ended in defeat to Cork, before Bohan eventually guided the Jackies to their second Brendan Martin Cup crown – and their first in seven years – in 2017.
“There’s loads of change. It’s really fresh, huge energy. Obviously a lot of the girls would know Derek and Paul, and we’d really, really respect the two lads. That just brings a freshness and a new energy to training,” Rowe added.
“Once it continues on an upward trajectory and once we can continue pushing and progressing, that’s what we want and that’s what the lads want from us at the end of the day. Mick was obviously a one of a kind manager and so, so successful. Every manager brings different things.
“Greg obviously got us to three All-Ireland finals and we just couldn’t get over the line. Mick got us over the line on numerous occasions. You’ll always have those people to be grateful for along the way. It’s great to be able to have a mix and match of different styles of management, and be able to adapt and change.”