Pretenders eye vacant throne
The crashing noise that reverberated across the county of Roscommon at lunchtime on Sunday was the sound of county champions St Brigid’s crashing out of the John Keane Kia SFC, following their seismic 4-10 to 2-10 defeat to St Dominic’s at Kiltoom in the quarter-final (see report elsewhere in this edition).
While St Dominic’s were the winners on the day, the result means that Boyle are now widely seen as the favourites for the Marie McAleer Cup after they negotiated a tricky challenge against a defensive St Ciarán’s team at Abbey Park.
Stellar defensive work from Ger Dowd’s visitors helped to curb the threat posed by county star Aisling Feely, but Michaela Ward (0-4) and Caoimhe Cregg (0-2) stepped up to the mark for Boyle, while Megan McKeon oversaw an equally watertight defensive effort.
16-year-old Katie Conroy has delivered some crucial scores for her club this year and her palmed goal in the 45th minute turned a tie that looked like it might go down to the wire, with just two points between the teams at that stage.
Instead Boyle finished with five points on the trot to march with confidence into their semi-final clash with Éire Óg on the weekend after next, while St Dominic’s will now play Clann na nGael.
St Croan’s narrowly miss out on IFC semis
The semi-final line-up in the Hannon’s Hotel IFC has also been confirmed with Pádraig Pearses playing host to Michael Glaveys tomorrow night (Friday) while Kilbride will travel to Northern Harps on Sunday, September 27th.
In an incredibly tight three-way battle for third and fourth place and the semi-final berths that came with them, it all came down to two close-range frees in Kilbride’s home tie against St Croan’s.
The West Roscommon club knew they needed a win to be sure of knockout football and they had the better of the contest for long stretches, inspired by Leah Malone (0-4), and Sinéad Kenny, who started in goal but came outfield to kick two crucial second-half points.
Kilbride’s doggedness kept them in the game, trailing by two (0-11 to 1-6) going into the last couple of minutes. Aisling Hanly delivered a moment of magic when she fired a 13m free over the heads of half a dozen St Croan’s defenders and into the roof of the net to nudge her side into the lead, and while Ella Thompson had the chance to reply in kind, her effort fizzed over the crossbar to give St Croan’s a draw on the day, but a result that was ultimately of no use.
Michael Glaveys knew their fate was in their own hands and they duly took care of business against Western Gaels, prevailing by 7-8 to 2-7 at Ballinlough. The result also means that Western Gaels will drop to the junior grade for 2027.
Shannon Hibbitt and Aoife Burke gave Glaveys the dream start with early goals and while Western Gaels hit back with 1-2 to narrow the gap, the contest swung decisively in favour of the home side with three crucial scores in the space of 90 seconds. Shauna Fleming got the ball rolling with a green flag, Aoife Burke added another superb individual goal and a Joanne Daly point kept up the momentum for Glaveys, who led by 4-6 to 1-3 at the turnaround.
Pearses will go into that semi-final on the back of a fifth win in a row, though the 2-12 to 0-10 scoreline in their table-topping clash with Northern Harps was slightly flattering, and it remains to be seen how solid the form is, given that both sides were assured of home semi-finals.
Lauren Shanagher with 0-6 was the leading light for the home side at Elphin but Harps left a good few scores behind them, and thanks to a first-half goal from Blathnaid Kelly and a late 1-3 from Laura Glennon off the bench, it was last year’s beaten finalists who prevailed.
All roads lead to (Four) Roads
One round of group games remains to be played in the Castlerea Vehicle Recycling Junior Championship this coming weekend and the meeting of Four Roads and Kilglass/Kilmore should be the tie with the most significance.
The North Roscommon amalgamation will need to shake off a poor showing on Sunday in Kilglass where Louise Brady (3), Niamh Feeney, Kate Murray, Sandra Keane and Gráinne Cribben got the goals in St Mary’s 7-11 to 0-5 win over an injury-hit home team.
Kate Murray burnished her reputation as one of the county’s leading threats from outside the arc with another two-point free for a St Mary’s side that will be expected to make it six wins in succession when they host Castlerea St Kevin’s this Sunday.
Castlerea are out of contention, after a toothless first-half performance in which they scored just a single point, left them too much to do against St Faithleach’s. It finished 1-7 to 0-5 in favour of the Ballyleague club, who have their fate in their own hands when they go up to play St Michael’s/St Ronan’s.
It was another story of so near but yet so far for the Saints, as they were only a goal adrift of a strong Oran team with 40 minutes played, but 0-11 on the spin from Oran left it 2-18 to 1-7 at the long whistle, with Hazel Kelly at midfield and Niamh Walsh up front, scorer of 1-9 in all, the leading lights for Oran.
The Junior ‘B’ Championship is also taking shape and it’s the two ‘first’ teams, Roscommon Gaels and Strokestown, who secured home advantage for the semi-finals by rounding off perfect group records with wins.
Roscommon Gaels racked up a 4-13 to 0-3 win over Clann na nGael to set up their meeting with St Brigid’s, but it was much tighter in Kiltoom on Friday night where Máire Mullooly made some vital saves in the Strokestown goal, Sarah Dixon controlled midfield for the visitors and Nicole McGinley’s four points were the difference in a 1-13 to 0-12 win for the black and amber.
Please see https://roscommonlgfa.ie/fixtures-2026/ for all updated fixtures and results. Roscommon LGFA would like to thank John Keane Kia, Hannon’s Hotel and Castlerea Vehicle Recycling for their generous sponsorship of the adult club championships in the county.
