St Mark’s players and management celebrate after completing a league and cup double following victories over Fingallians and Thomas Davis
St Mark’s complete league and cup double
ST MARK’S Women’s team saw much success over the last week or so as they emerged victorious in both the league and cup finals.
The league final came first and took place last Wednesday at Lawless Memorial Park as they clashed against Fingallians.
It would be an incredibly high scoring game in terms of goalscoring with Mark’s getting the ball in the back of the net six times with Fingallians managing to do so on five occasions.
It would end up being a comfortable nine point win for Mark’s with the game being decided by a final scoreline of 6-09 to 5-03.
Both side had finished on level terms in the league with 27 points between the two. When the pair met in the league it was actually Fingallians who had gotten the better of Marks coming out with a 5-09 to 2-06 win.
The two sides would also be pushed to the end by Good Counsel Liffey Gaels who finished on 24 points with distance separating the top three from the remaining pack.
Mark’s would follow on with that league win with a Division 10A cup final win last weekend against Thomas Davis.
The game would be held at Kiltipper Road and saw out a fairly comfortable victory for Mark’s with the scoreline 4-18 to 1-02.
The result was extremely impressive given that Mark’s had come up against Davis’ on two occasions earlier on in the year and been defeated both times.
Mark’s came so close to a triple this year, missing out in their Championship final so will have to be happy with just two pieces of silverware for the trophy cabinet.
Team Coach Hayden Moore touched on the plans for the team in the future.
“It definitely brings momentum for next year. We have a goal for our team to be around Junior A or Intermediate within a few years.
‘This is the third year of the adult football team. We are in a really good spot going into year four.
‘They have the league and cup medals now but there is one thing that has eluded us for the last three years and that’s the championship medal.
‘That’s a goal I’ve set for them now it’s up to them to go do it. There’s a good squad there and girls are really eager to learn and develop and push on. Hopefully we can get the third trophy across the line next year.”
The win represents massive growth for Mark’s who have rebuilt their women’s section over the last 10 years or so.
Without a consistent adult women’s side since the late 2000s, the club made a conscious effort to prioritise establishing their women’s section running Gaelic for Girls Program in order to boost participation rates.
In doing this the club were able to dramatically increase their playerbase and are now reaping the rewards with this season being the third for their Adult side since that generation of players came through.
The club ran the program again at juvenile level just last year and found similar success managing to create three new youth sides.
Moore spoke on the impact that the program had on the club.
“It was a major priority, you had the men’s and juvenile boy’s teams that were still there but we didn’t have girls graduating from juvenile section in adult section because there was no adult team so it was a major priority.
‘To be doing that now and be going into year four is a massive achievement. It’s huge.
‘At the same time you don’t want to just exist, the girls do want to compete and kick on, compete at the highest level possible.”
