Archive News
Molloy hoping to lead WomenÕs Sevens side to World Cup
Date Published: 20-Jun-2012
Having recently guided her side through the first stage of qualification towards the 2013 World Cup Sevens, Ireland Sevens rugby captain Claire Molloy credits her Ladies football background as laying the foundation for her own personal success in the game to date.
Galway City native Molloy – who is also a member of the country’s 15-a-side international set-up – proved to be a central figure in Ireland’s European Sevens Championships qualification tournament success in Belgium recently . . . a tournament Ireland won following an impressive 29-0 final victory over Scotland.
Ireland, who entered the European circuit ranked 35th out of 35 teams, did not concede a single point over the course of the competition, defeating the established Czech Republic 40-0, hosts Belgium 31-0, Poland 43-0 and Israel 55-0 to book their place in the semi-final, where they massacred Georgia 51-0.
They now advance to the next stage of the championships, which take place in Moscow later this month. They have been seeded 14th out of the 16 teams participating and, following the draw on Monday, have been pooled with second-seeds Spain along with Italy and Sweden, who are ranked sixth and 10th respectively. Ireland need a top five finish to qualify for the Women’s World Cup next year.
Molloy is thoroughly enjoying her rugby at present and, although she often misses the cut and thrust of the Ladies football scene at club and county, she has few regrets regarding the sporting path she has chosen. As a matter of fact, she would encourage other ladies footballers to do the same.
“There are definitely lots of Gaelic footballers who I feel would love the chance to try their hands at rugby sevens,” says the multi-talented 23-years-old, who is a final year medicine student at Cardiff University in Wales. “Hopefully, the prospect of [playing in] the Olympics will tempt a few players out.”
In many respects, it has been this possibility that seems to have spurred the powers-that-be in this country into action, with the Ireland women’s Sevens team only founded in April of this year. The initial aim is qualification for the 2013 World Cup but after that one suspects the set-up will be gearing up for when the sport makes its debut at the 2016 Olympics.
“We don’t know what the plan is at the moment [regarding the Olympics],” says Molloy. “They haven’t announced the qualification system, but obviously Sevens is now an Olympic sport so Ireland getting involved in the set-up can only be positive.
“You know, though, with the wealth of talent that is in Ladies football and the athletes we have in this country, Ireland has the potential to have a fantastic Sevens team. So, you never know, we might see a few more Galway girls involved in the not-too-distant future.”
As it is, there is a strong ladies football representation in the Irish sevens squad, according to Molloy.
“There are quite a few of us Gaelic players. Jenny Murphy would have played for Kildare and Alison Miller would have lined out for Laois. Claire Keohane has played for Cork underage while Ashling Hutchinson, I think, is within the Cork set-up currently. So, there are quite a few football faces in there.”
In any event, the Irish captain believes Sevens rugby can only be good for women’s sport and for the high achievers it offers an outlet to compete at a higher, international level. For Molloy’s part, she is determined to make the most of an opportunity that, as she admits herself, to some degree came about as chance.
Securing her place at Cardiff University, Molloy needed a sporting outlet to replace Ladies football, which, up to then, had been such a big part of her life. For instance, in 2005, she gave a Player of the Match performance when Galway captured their second All-Ireland minor Ladies football title with victory over Donegal, and displays in that competition secured her a berth on the county’s senior side.
For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.
People’s living conditions less than 100 years ago were frightening. We have come a long way. We talk about water charges today, but back then the local District Councils were erecting pumps for local communities and the lovely town of Mountbellew, according to Council minutes, had open sewers,” says Galway County Council archivist Patria McWalter.
Patria believes we “need to take pride in our history, and we should take the same pride in our historical records as we do in our built heritage”. When you see the wealth of material in her care, this belief makes sense.
She is in charge of caring for the rich collection of administrative records owned by Galway County Council and says “these records are as much part of our history as the Rock of Cashel is. They document our lives and our ancestors’ lives. And nobody can plan for the future unless you learn from the past, what worked and what didn’t”.
Archivists and librarians are often unfairly regarded as being dry, academic types, but that’s certainly not true of Patria. Her enthusiasm is infectious as she turns the pages of several minute books from Galway’s Rural District Councils, all of them at least 100 years old.
Part of her role involved cataloguing all the records of the Councils – Ballinasloe, Clifden, Galway, Gort, Loughrea, Mountbellew, Portumna and Tuam. These records mostly consisted of minutes of various meetings.
When she was cataloguing them she realised their worth to local historians and researchers, so she decided to compile a guide to their content. The result is For the Record: The Archives of Galway’s Rural District Councils, which will be a valuable asset to anybody with an interest in history.
Many representatives on these Councils were local personalities and several were arrested during the political upheaval of the era, she explains.
And, ushering in a new era in history, women were allowed to sit on these Rural District Councils – at the time they were not allowed to sit on County Councils.
All of this information is included in Patria’s introductory essay to the attractively produced A4 size guide, which gives a glimpse into how these Rural Councils operated and the way political thinking changed in Ireland during a short 26-year period. In the early 1900s, these Councils supported Home Rule, but by 1920, they were calling for full independence and refusing to recognise the British administration.
“I love the tone,” says Patria of the minutes from meetings. “The language was very emotive.”
That was certainly true of the Gort Rural District Council. At a meeting in 1907, following riots in Dublin at the premiere of JM Synge’s play, The Playboy of the Western World the councillors’ response was vehement. They recorded their decision to “protest most emphatically against the libellous comedy, The Playboy of the Western World, that was belched forth during the past week in the Abbey Theatre, Dublin, under the fostering care of Lady Gregory and Mr Yeats. We congratulate the good people of Dublin in howling down the gross buffoonery and immoral suggestions that are scattered throughout this scandalous performance.
For more from the archives see this week’s Tribunes here
Date Published: 23-Jan-2013
SLIGO 0-9
GALWAY 1-4
FRANK FARRAGHER IN ENNISCRONE
GALWAY’S first serious examination of the 2013 season rather disturbingly ended with a rating well below the 40% pass mark at the idyllic, if rather Siberian, seaside setting of Enniscrone on Sunday last.
The defeat cost Galway a place in the FBD League Final against Leitrim and also put a fair dent on their confidence shield for the bigger tests that lie ahead in February.
There was no fluke element in this success by an understrength Sligo side and by the time Leitrim referee, Frank Flynn, sounded the final whistle, there wasn’t a perished soul in the crowd of about 500 who could question the justice of the outcome.
It is only pre-season and last Sunday’s blast of dry polar winds did remind everyone that this is far from summer football, but make no mistake about it, the match did lay down some very worrying markers for Galway following a couple of victories over below par third level college teams.
Galway did start the game quite positively, leading by four points at the end of a first quarter when they missed as much more, but when Sligo stepped up the tempo of the game in the 10 minutes before half-time, the maroon resistance crumbled with frightening rapidity.
Some of the statistics of the match make for grim perusal. Over the course of the hour, Galway only scored two points from play and they went through a 52 minute period of the match, without raising a white flag – admittedly a late rally did bring them close to a draw but that would have been very rough justice on Sligo.
Sligo were backable at 9/4 coming into this match, the odds being stretched with the ‘missing list’ on Kevin Walsh’s team sheet – Adrian Marren, Stephen Coen, Tony Taylor, Ross Donovan, David Kelly, David Maye, Johnny Davey and Eamon O’Hara, were all marked absent for a variety of reasons.
Walsh has his Sligo side well schooled in the high intensity, close quarters type of football, and the harder Galway tried to go through the short game channels, the more the home side bottled them up.
Galway badly needed to find some variety in their attacking strategy and maybe there is a lot to be said for the traditional Meath style of giving long, quick ball to a full forward line with a big target man on the edge of the square – given Paul Conroy’s prowess close to goal last season, maybe it is time to ‘settle’ on a few basics.
Defensively, Galway were reasonably solid with Gary Sice at centre back probably their best player – he was one of the few men in maroon to deliver decent long ball deep into the attacking zone – while Finian Hanley, Conor Costello and Gary O’Donnell also kept things tight.
For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.
Date Published: 23-Jan-2013
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