All Ireland Ladies Senior Football Championship Final
Laois 2-14, Mayo 1-16
After 70 minutes of gripping action, the manner of the win could hardly have been more dramatic. With the sides deadlocked, Mayo goalkeeper, Denise Horan, sent her kick out to Cora Staunton who was standing within the parallelogram. The referee immediately awarded Laois a free directly in front of the Mayo posts, which Mary Kirwan dispatched over the bar with one second to play.
Kirwan opened and closed the scoring as she managed her first point in the first minute of the game, but Cora Staunton levelled with her first of five first half points in Mayo’s next attack.
In what was an entertaining opening period, the two sides traded scores for the first 17 minutes with a number of players on both sides registering successful efforts. However, Laois then enjoyed a purple patch, contradicting pre-match expectations, which earmarked them as rank outsiders. The veteran Sue Ramsbottom led the charge with a point before two Kirwan frees opened a three-point gap.
Diane O’Hora reduced the deficit when she shot over the bar, but Laois midfielder, Kathleen O’Reilly then scored a goal for the O’Moores, bursting through the Mayo cover before firing high into Denise Horan’s net.
That left the score 1-8 to 0-6, but it was as good as it got for the Leinster champions in the opening half as Mayo demonstrated their double championship credentials by dismantling Laois’ five-point cushion. It was little surprise that corner forward, Cora Staunton, led the fightback, as she has been central to the Connacht side’s last two All-Ireland successes, despite missing the 1999 final and she would finish this game with a ten-point total.
Staunton scored three points in quick succession from play and dead balls, and she was aided by two further efforts from Claire Egan and Christina Heffernan to leave the champions with an unlikely two-point lead at the interval with the scores at 1-10 to 1-8.
Laois’ challenge seemed to evaporate soon after the break as they fell four points behind when Diane O’Hora fired over. However, Sean Delaney’s side picked themselves back up, with Kirwan scoring two points plus a penalty, which she stitched high into the net.
That left the midlanders 2-11 to 1-13 ahead. Midfielder, Aideen O’Loughlin also chipped in with two efforts, although Mayo were not about to lie down, O’Hora and Cora Staunton managing three conversions between them to level the scores in the dying minutes, before Kirwan’s last gasp free sent the Laois team and supporters into delirious scenes of celebration.
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